


save me now before i give up (help me out before i drown)

by BookwormBlake1993



Category: The 100 (TV), The 100 Series - Kass Morgan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Cross-Posted on FanFiction.Net, Dark Clarke Griffin, Endgame Bellamy Blake/Clarke Griffin, Episode: s05e12 Damocles Part 1, F/M, Guess which s6 plot is not in here, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Power of Words, Rewrite, Self-Hatred, Slow Build, Slow Burn, fuck the flame and sheidheda
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-04-06
Updated: 2020-09-18
Packaged: 2021-03-02 01:47:43
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 53,570
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23517157
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BookwormBlake1993/pseuds/BookwormBlake1993
Summary: With the war for Eden practically over, McCreary presents Wonkru with three choices: continue to fight and die, flee to the wasteland and starve, or surrender on the condition that they help his people get back on their feet. With his mind on his friends in the valley, Bellamy agrees to option three. Making him one of fifty.As Bellamy and his friends struggle to adjust to their new grim reality, Clarke succumbs to her dark side and impulses after ostracization from some of her friends; jeopardizing her relationship with her mom, Madi, and the few still close to her and pulling her closer to McCreary.Unaware that there will be a hand ready to help her pull her out of the abyss.
Relationships: Bellamy Blake/Clarke Griffin, Clarke Griffin/Paxton McCreary
Comments: 15
Kudos: 72





	1. Chapter One

**Author's Note:**

> Is an repost of an story I took down earlier. Hope it's better this time. 
> 
> Also: The character of Dani McCreary is a OC. She’s not canon (then again, what is canon). Character profile here: https://clarke-the-ferrari.tumblr.com/post/185248386538/the-100-original-character-profile

“May We Meet Again,” Clarke said, watching the tendrils of the Flame go back inside of it. That was the new passphrase, according to one Dani McCreary after she managed to hack into the Flame.

“Hopefully she should return to normal and stop speaking robot speak,” Dani tried to assure as Clarke’s mom went to work on closing up the incision. “Then again, what is it with putting degraded tech into the necks of twelve-year-olds?”

Clarke gazed at Madi, remembering the reason Bellamy gave for wanting to put the Flame in Madi. One part of her brain understood why, though the other part knew that it was best to leave, as she believed that Bellamy was placing Madi in a dangerous situation.

“I am not sure,” Clarke said, glancing at Madi. When the anesthesia wears off, will Madi wake up. And Clarke bit her lip, not looking forward to what Madi might say about them leaving Bellamy.

It was evident that she admired him from all the stories she told her. Yes, she was mad at her, but she was under the influence of the Flame. Who knows what Madi would say without its impact.

The door swings open, and one of the prisoners walks in. Clarke couldn’t keep track of their names through the course of the week she was here. Maybe it was Braxton. She hung around with Dani a lot.

“Your dad has been trying to get a hold of you through the radio,” she said, raising one thick, black eyebrow at Clarke. As if something interesting happened regarding her.

“Well, that’s his problem,” Dani retorted. “He should have known that I wasn’t interested in listening to that…chaos that he calls music.”

She was referring to the massacre that the older McCreary no doubt had broadcast. The gunshots, the screams of pain and anguish…Clarke swallowed back bile at the thought of that.

Braxton turned to Clarke, “Also, because she didn’t have her radio on, Graveyard told me to tell you that your boyfriend passed through. Yet, so far, he seems to be the only one so far.”

“What?” Dani asked as Clarke tried to process the information. “Last time I knew, dad wasn’t willing to let them surrender.”

“That’s what happens when you keep your radio off,” she answers. “Apparently Kane and the Colonel told him that we won’t survive long without the help of doctors and what not. He just announced to Wonkru that they had twenty-four hours to decide if they want to fight and die, flee and starve, or surrender and help us get back on our feet.”

Clarke’s eyes widened with shock before she could stop herself. Yet, relief filled her. Bellamy was alive. He survived what Octavia ever imposed on him. He was alive. He was here. He –

At that moment, horror seeded at the seed of her stomach. He couldn’t possibly…no, no, NO! Yes, she made the decision to come here, to give a sociopathic mass-murdering sadist the upper hand in this war (as horrible as it was, at least Madi will get to live. Her mom will get to live.), but Bellamy. She didn’t want this for him.

Also –

“He’s not my boyfriend,” Clarke pointed out. He was her friend, but they weren’t romantically involved.

Braxton shrugged. “Well, almost all of us came to that conclusion as he was willing to pull the plug on two hundred and eighty-three of us for you,” she answered. “That is some relationship goals right there.”

Clarke remembered that night well. Even when she thought it was hallucination induced by the rounds of torture from the shock collar by McCreary’s hand on Diyoza’s orders. When Bellamy said that she was that important to him to sacrifice two hundred and eighty-three lives for her…

She blinked away the tears. Has that changed ever since she left Bellamy at Octavia’s mercy? It must have.

“Well, then…” Dani slams her hands on the table. “I’m certain dad has a mouthful about why I turned my radio off. Might as well get it over with.”

She leaves the building and slams the door behind her; with Braxton leaving shortly after. Leaving Clarke to turn her gaze back to an unconscious Madi. She swallowed deeply.

“Clarke?” asked her mom in concern.

“Last time I saw Bellamy, I left him at Octavia’s mercy,” Clarke said, remembering the look on his face after she slapped him. “If he knows what I did…”

“As much as it was an ugly decision, I think he will come to understand,” her mom said in assurance. “McCreary made it difficult for you to not help him.”

Clarke nodded, remembering his threat six days ago to that he would kill Madi, her, and possibly her mom if her mom wouldn’t cure them after she got on her feet. She didn’t enjoy choosing the wrong side of this war. Yet, she would do whatever it takes for her family to live.

From irradiating Mount Weather and now this…Clarke was no stranger to making ugly decisions.

She sits down next to the examination table as her mom goes to the back of the gas station to take a rest. They have been doing one hundred and twenty-two procedures for the past five days. And her body ached with the fatigue. Oh how she needed to rest.

Clarke rests her head by the table and closes her eyes. Only to be woken up by Madi abruptly sitting up. Taking deep breaths as if in a panic.

“Hey, you’re safe,” Clarke tried to assure her, seeing Madi feel the back of her neck. “You’re safe.”

“Clarke, you didn’t…” she said, a look of betrayal on her face. One that stung Clarke.

“I had to, Madi,” Clarke pleaded, feeling her eyes glisten with hot tears. “I had to stop you from running towards the battlefield. To make sure that you live.”

“I agreed to take the Flame so Octavia wouldn’t kill you!” Madi exclaimed.

“As I said, Octavia would have killed us,” Clarke pointed out. “If she didn’t, you would have been a target to those on her side.”

“And you don’t care that we left Bellamy to die?” Madi demanded. “And what makes you think that McCreary wouldn’t kill us?”

Clarke stepped back. Madi didn’t have the Flame in her this time, and it didn’t help her that Madi had a point. That McCreary would find an excuse to kill her, Madi, and her mom. Yet, Clarke was going to make sure that it wouldn’t come to that.

“I am going to make sure that he doesn’t,” Clarke tried to assure her. “As for Bellamy…” Clarke swallowed. “He’s alive, Madi. He’s here.”

Madi’s eyes widened. “He’s alive?” she asked. “How?”

“I don’t know when he came, but I heard about it from an hour ago,” Clarke answered.

The blood drained from her face. “Are they going to allow us to see him?” she asked. “Hopefully they didn’t hurt him.”

Clarke knew that this would come up. She wasn’t ready to see Bellamy after she left him in Polis. Nor was she eager to turn the radio back on. As McCreary was going to keep the mic open until it ended.

But her heart urged her to find Bellamy. To explain her recent decision and apologize for leaving him to the fighting pits. With shaking hands, Clarke picked up the radio and turned it on. It was silent, with only an occasional correspondence between a few people regarding changing shifts in the Pillboxes, though she jumped when she heard a gunshot ring out.

“Where is Bellamy?” she asked, her throat dry.

Silence reigned on the other side before an answer came in. “In the church where Diyoza’s precious savages were housed,” answered McCreary. “Never thought that you would be eager to have a reunion with him.”

Clarke cringed at the second part of his response. As if he was trying to elicit some type of response from her. He didn’t like to just cause physical pain so he can sit back and enjoy it. It was like McCreary enjoyed trying to elicit some emotional response to show that he distressed them.

Though the scorn and disdain that was in his tone about the people that she and Madi witnessed him killing almost a week ago was just as troubling. Not to mention that the group contained friends like Raven and Murphy. Ironic even as he was a savage himself for torturing and killing people, and getting off on it.

“That’s all I needed to know,” she said, ignoring that particular second part of his response. Clarke wasn’t going to let him get to her. “Thanks.”

And with that, she turned off the radio.

“Here we go,” she muttered, her palms sweating. Maybe if she pulled Bellamy out of there, she wouldn’t be dreading their next conversation.

* * *

The cold metal of the collar seeped into the skin of his neck. Cold to the touch as he graced it with his fingers. Bellamy swallowed, thinking back to Mount Weather as they collared him while they sterilized him and other Grounders.

Thinking about how it must have felt around…no, Bellamy didn’t want to go there.

It has been a few hours since the Wonkru army was fired upon at the gorge. When dozens were massacred around him and Octavia. A couple hours ago when they heard a message from a P.A system.

“This doesn’t have to end this way, you know,” came McCreary’s voice. “You have three choices: either you fight, and my men here will shoot you down, you flee towards the wasteland and starve to death, or you can surrender on the condition that you help us get back on our feet. You have twenty-four hours, and if I were you, I would pick option three.”

To Bellamy, all options would result in death. Even if he didn’t die immediately after choosing option three, he might get killed. Also, Bellamy would instead take any death then help these bastards rebuild.

Yes, the original hundred were criminals, but they were nothing compared to these people. And formally led by both a former rogue Navy SEAL Colonel and a contract killer for a notorious Irish Mob to now just the latter to a boot. He just couldn’t, and hopefully, nobody would consider the third option.

_Your friends are there_ , his heart urged him. _Echo is there_.

He just couldn’t leave his friends. Even if Monty and Harper were in the wasteland, he couldn’t leave Echo, Murphy, Raven, Wells, and Emori there. As for Monty and Harper, he had a feeling that McCreary would be presenting the same ultimatum to those in the wasteland.

He didn’t want to leave Octavia, but this might be no different from poisoning her just to save Clarke.

Hands shaking, he lifted his hands as he stood up.

“Bellamy, no!” Octavia hissed. “Take another step, and I’ll kill you if you cross back.”

He ignored his sister’s words of protests as he approached the Pillboxes. Hoping that Octavia doesn’t spring up and lunge forward. As these people killed someone just for trying to help her.

“Take me!” he shouted, keeping his hands raised.

Within moments, he was taken from the gorge and dragged towards the valley. Marched towards their dropship. Walking him to the lion’s den.

“Well, I should have known,” mused the monster, a smirk curling his lips as he looked at Bellamy. “That you be the one to take option three. Eager to reunite with your girlfriend?”

Bellamy could only scowl at him as the thought of Clarke twisted in his stomach like a knife. It hurt him that Clarke never understood that it was to protect her. That Madi would only have the Flame until Octavia was denounced. If he had explained that the Flame would be temporary, she wouldn’t have run off and in turn, sided with a mass murdering sadist.

As for Clarke –

“She’s not my girlfriend,” Bellamy pointed out.

“For shame,” McCreary replied with a smirk. “With all that hubbub about you willing to kill two hundred and eighty-three of our men for her, it was only natural that we came to that conclusion. Well, that doesn’t hurt my feelings any.”

There was something there in the cadence of his tone that seeded unease in Bellamy’s stomach. The same vibes he got when he heard McCreary say, “she’s a feisty one, pretty too” over the radio transmission right after he caught Clarke (back when Bellamy thought they were talking about Octavia).

“If you ever…” he began to threaten.

“For someone that says that you aren’t her boyfriend, you sure are protective of her,” he sneered before grabbing his shirt. All amusement was gone from his face and replaced with venom. “If I make myself clear: no one challenges me here, and if you want to live, I suggest that’s the first rule you follow every day.”

He pushed him away, and within moments, Bellamy felt the cold metal of the shock collar. Feeling his shit-eating grin on him as it was done. “Piss us off any, and we’ll be forced to push this button. It doesn’t feel pleasant,” he was told.

They dragged him to a small chapel located in the valley. Leaving him alone for hours save for one Eligius prisoner who came in with a plate of food.

He didn’t touch his food, for he could only think about his friends that were in the wasteland. His girlfriend and friends who were still here somewhere, who probably think that he’s still at the gorge.

Octavia. Guilt riddled him as he thought about her still in the gorge, but with her, if she surrendered, McCreary would execute her.

The rain was tapping against the window when he heard the door open. He turned to see her and Madi. Looking at Clarke, a ripple of pain went through him. Remembering the sting from her palm after she slapped him. Remembering how she left him to die in the fighting pits and sided with McCreary.

And looking at Clarke’s eyes, it was as if she was uncertain about how this reunion might go. Like she felt she would deserve whatever anger or hurt that he would direct at her.

Looking over at Madi, the sight of the bandage peeking to the edges of her neck confirmed that the Flame was removed. Madi looks between her and him and leaves; saying something going outside. Clarke looked after her, concern on her features.

Though she turned her gaze back to Bellamy.

“Clarke, so you –” he started.

“I had to,” she interrupted. “In fact, I refrained from trying to get it out of her head until this morning. Thankfully Dani was able to catch her before she was able to get far.”

Dani. Bellamy vaguely remembered her as McCreary’s daughter. Arrested for cyber crimes in connection with the same Irish Mob her father was an enforcer to.

“All I wanted to do was protect you, Clarke,” he agonized. “Madi agreed to take the Flame long enough until Octavia was denounced.”

“Her choice or not, it was a stupid and reckless idea, and you know it,” Clarke seethed. “Octavia could have killed her, or her followers would have killed her the moment she poses as a threat.”

“If you don’t think that I wouldn’t have gone out of my way to make sure that didn’t happen, then you don’t know me at all,” he snapped. “Besides, how can you be sure that the same thing couldn’t be said about McCreary?”

Clarke winced as if he slapped her in the face, and Bellamy almost felt guilty for making her feel that way. But she had to know that he wasn’t that reckless. “And you don’t think that Octavia and her followers wouldn’t have killed you first to get to Madi?” Clarke demanded.

It was at those words when every possible argument that Bellamy had evaporated. Octavia would try to kill him, Gaia, and Indra to get to Madi before any of her followers could. It was like six years ago, back when they were arguing in Arkadia after he had helped Pike massacre the Trikru army outside their gates. Only the roles were reversed. Except –

Shit.

“Just as you have gone out of your way to protect Octavia, I am going out of my way to protect Madi, even if it means siding with a mass-murdering sociopath,” Clarke continued. “But don’t think for a second that I don’t regret leaving you at Octavia’s mercy, because I do. And if you think I don’t, you don’t know me as well as you think you do.”

With those words, Clarke turned towards the door, and Bellamy felt something in him break as he watched her walk away.

“Clarke, wait,” he called, taking a few footsteps towards the door. He wanted to try to explain himself. Acknowledge that he was in no place to judge her as he literally sided with Pike six years earlier with the same reasoning: to protect Octavia and everyone else he cared about. Yet, something told him that maybe now was not the best time. That perhaps it was best if things cooled down.

Thinking back to the conversation between him and Clarke in the wasteland almost two weeks ago, this recent confirmation confirmed that they really swapped the roles of the Head and the Heart. And it started when she encouraged him to use his head six years ago.

And she took it to use her heart as well.

* * *

After having just told Kane that he could now see his girlfriend, Paxton left the transport ship; heading towards that run-down trailer that Dani claimed as her workshop. After all, Dani was there at this time of night.

Tinkering with something or another to modify it or get it to working again. If she helped with those missiles when the expiration for that gladiator’s cult decision arrives, that would be great. Too bad commanding an ship was not on her rap sheet of expertise.

“Yep, inside,” he said to himself as he heard the music blasting from the trailer. That rock music that she would listen to. Heck, nearly everyone in this camp loved that genre. “Dani,” he called out, knocking the doorjamb.

No response.

Why didn’t that surprise him after their conversation ended off a wrong note?

“You should have kept your radio on,” he told her hours earlier after she strolled into the bridge before he could think to summon her. “Days like this are when I could use you for something.”

“Dad, you know me well enough that I couldn't stomach hearing the shit that you call music,” she retorted. “That’s all levels of screwed up and you know it.”

Of course, her repulsion was not an surprise to him. Even when she did not resist taking tips on how to defend herself when they were in that training facility for six months, she was still soft in some areas. Something he should have expected from an former computer hacker.

“Just see it as an indication when the war stops,” he justified. “If you don’t like hearing it, it’s your problem. After all, I’m making sure that savages don’t steal this land from us, and we’re winning.”

She threw her hands in the air and said, “Well, dad, I got to say, I never thought anything would top you killing the MedTech but this does.”

Dani still wasn’t over that, it seemed. She was never going to let that die, even if he was getting sick by her mentioning it over and over again. Good thing she was his daughter or he would have shot her brains out for that a long time ago.

Stepping into her workshop, he could see her tinkering with a couple radios. Probably fixing the mics in them. “Keeping busy?” he asked as he stepped forward.

“Someone has got to fix these radios,” she answered, not looking away from her project. “Then after that, I’m hoping to finish my project of modifying the particle scanners.”

He knew his daughter well enough that when she wasn’t making eye contact, that was when she was mad at him. A habit of hers ever since she started high school.

“Listen.” He pulls a stool up and sits down. “I get that you don’t like to stomach hearing the howls of our enemy. But sometimes we hear things that we don’t like. Just a part of life, Dani.”

“Well, what happens after all this is over?” she asked him, the skepticism heavy in her voice.

“As it should have been when we came back home,” he assured. “Before we even agreed to let out that cannibalistic blood cult from that bunker.”

If he had his way, he would have just let the Doc out and put more rubble over the damn place.

* * *

Clarke and Madi didn’t stay too long at the gas station, for her mom told them to sleep in the church. She guessed that the reason so that she could talk to Kane privately, as they heard this morning that he and Diyoza came over to McCreary’s side.

She had sent Madi inside. “Go to sleep,” she encouraged. “I’ll join you later.”

As Bellamy was inside, Clarke wasn’t willing to sleep there right away. Maybe an hour or two until he wouldn’t notice her come inside. She wiped away the tears as she thought about their argument.

It hurt that Bellamy didn’t seem to understand that she was going above and beyond to protect the ones she loves. Something that he should know as his mantra has always been “My sister, my responsibility.”

She pulled out the Flame from her jacket. Gazing at it, Madi’s dried black blood coating it, Clarke could only think of the damage that it could have caused. Yes, it was out of her, but chances are that she wouldn’t be the same person she was before she took it.

The blood reached her face and hands as she clenched around it. She was going to make sure that the days of the Flame should come to an end. After all, shouldn’t they have ended after the second Praimfaya?

With that thought in mind, Clarke strode to the van where Madi’s parents hid her from the Flamekeepers. Which apparently became the workshop for Dani McCreary. 

Whiny rock music was blasting through the speakers as Clarke stepped in. Dani was paying no mind as she was dissecting a radio. Talking with one of her fellow inmates. Judging by their conversation, it appeared that McCreary dropped in to visit his daughter and that Dani was irritated by what he had to say.

Clarke wondered how they can get away with that unless it was always out of his earshot. Though she wasn’t here to eavesdrop. She looked through the toolkit and picked up the first hammer she found. Not hesitating to smash the Flame with it.

She could feel both sets of eyes on her, though she heard one of them clap their hands in applause. Probably Dani, as she helped in removing the Flame in the first place.

Clarke had smashed the Flame until it was in tiny pieces before discarding its remains into a bucket of parts that were obviously faulty due to the haphazard way they were placed. She was about to leave when she eyed a set of radios sitting on the charger. It was a risk as the massacre was going on, though she wouldn’t put it past one of her friends to betray her and whisk Madi away to the warzone.

Especially after Bellamy put her in that situation, to begin with.

“No, use this one,” said Dani as she moved to pick up a radio. “It’s fully charged and has better battery power.”

“Thanks,” Clarke replied as Dani passed her the radio.

She raised her thumb up in response as Clarke turned on the mic and put it in her back pocket. It was in bad taste, selling out her friends to McCreary to protect Madi. But she was willing to make sure that they wouldn’t get away with risking her life. Bellamy might hate her for it, but hopefully, he should understand sooner.

As she returned to the church to enter through the backdoor, she thought she saw the door open a crack. Caution sets in Clarke as anxiety surfaces into her. Good thing she could be armed, or else she would be in trouble.

“Are you insane?” she heard Bellamy whisper. “Now get out of here before Clarke comes back and before McCreary finds out you are here.”

Hearing that Bellamy was trying to back her up, Clarke felt guilt swarm her for what she was about to do. She contemplated throwing the radio to the ground. Try warning them away without giving indication that they were here, but a voice whispered that there was no turning back to her latest decision.

“You heard what he said,” she said as she strode into the church, holding up her gun.

Seeing who it was, her heart sunk. Well, she wasn’t surprised that Echo would do this, as Echo was from a clan that allowed children to fight at a young age. But Raven? Clarke barely knew Shaw from the one time she saw him, but surely they knew better.

Knew better then to whisk a twelve year old to a active warzone.

“Clarke, put the gun down,” said Bellamy, putting his hand up. “I got this.”

As the real damage might occur at any moment, Clarke lowered her gun, feeling the glares from Raven and Echo.

“Now, get out of here,” Bellamy urged.

“What have you done?” Raven demanded, jerking her head to Madi. Ignoring what Bellamy said to her.

“What needed to be done,” Clarke answered.

“And the Flame?” Echo demanded, advancing towards her. Bellamy grabs her arm.

“What are you doing?” he demanded. “All of you. Go before he gets here!”

“What should have been done six years ago,” Clarke answered, feeling the heat reach her face. “Besides, it was stupid to begin with to have children lead millions of people.”

“Why you –” Echo barely finished her sentence before lunging at her. Bellamy’s shouts and Madi’s pleas filled the room as Echo toppled her. Her gun going off as her back landed on the floor. Clarke beat her fists against Echo’s side and other vital places, but she was no match for the former Azgedan spy.

“Echo! Get off her!” Bellamy shouted as she felt him pulling Echo away from her. “I said get off of her!”

“She left you to die!” shouted as she felt her hands leave her. “She betrayed us! She’s the reason why you are here and collared like a rabid dog!”

She could sense Madi approach her as Clarke regained her focus. Using her hand and feet to push herself to standing position when she felt the radio leave her back pocket.

“Her mic is open!” Raven exclaimed. “Clarke, what the hell!?”

Clarke turned her gaze to Bellamy; his body frozen as he looked at her with wide eyes. As if he didn’t know whether to process the situation. “Sorry,” she mouthed as she looked at him.

“We have to go now!” Echo shouted, and the three of them dispersed. Only for two of the entrances to open. Clarke saw Echo stop as McCreary strode in; flanked by two of his lackeys.

“Take our pilot and his girlfriend back to the ship,” he ordered, gesturing at Raven and Shaw.

“No!” Bellamy shouted, moving to stand between them. Clarke put her hand out to stop him, though it didn’t stop McCreary from pressing on the button. The electricity flowing from the collar around Bellamy’s neck.

The urgency kicked in as Clarke kneeled besides Bellamy. Madi with her.

“Kill the spy,” McCreary ordered lazily as Bellamy rolled to his side.

“No,” Clarke exclaimed, standing up.

McCreary and his lackeys turned their eyes to her. “What do they want with her?” McCreary asked, gesturing to Madi.

“I took care of it,” Clarke answered.

“Then give me one good reason why I shouldn’t order my men to blow her brains out,” he said.

Clarke swallowed, knowing that she had to act fast. If she allowed McCreary to kill Echo, Bellamy would definitely not forgive her.

“You gave Wonkru a choice if they want to surrender under the condition that they help you,” Clarke pointed out. “There are a few people in the woods that can also help us, and let her give them the same choice.”

“Clarke…” Bellamy began in protest.

Clarke turned to Bellamy, hoping to communicate as much as she could using her facial expressions. It had worked in the past, so it should six years later. After a moment, Bellamy nodded as he seemed to realize what she was conveying.

McCreary grabbed Echo by the lapels of her jacket and pulled her closer to him. “Now, go find your friends and tell them that they have twenty-four hours if they want to help us get back on our feet,” he threatened. “If not, it looks like I’ll get a new problem after I end this war.”

He pushes her away as if she was a rotten apple core before his lackeys march her out the door. Echo glaring at her as she was forced out.

Clarke swallowed as he turned his attention towards her. “Thank you, Clarke,” he said. “Now that we got our missiles, it’s time to end this so that both our children can live happily ever after.”

Clarke could feel Bellamy’s glare directed at McCreary, and she felt her skin crawl as he bent down to look at Madi; touching the top of her head with his hand. Clarke registered Madi’s frown through the orange lighting as she recoiled her head away from him just as he left the church.

* * *

Anxiety over his friends’ safety filled the pit of his stomach for the rest of the night, making sleep difficult to come by. Concern over Echo, who was getting the rest of their friends in the valley. Concern over especially Raven and Shaw, even if he barely knew the latter, being imprisoned and probably tortured.

_Don’t give him what he wants, Raven_ , he thought to himself. _Don’t give him the strength to wipe most of them out_.

Yet, something told him that such thoughts would be in vain.

Bellamy jumped when he heard the door open. Expecting to see more Eligius mooks, his eyes widened when he saw who it was.

“Monty? Harper?” he whispered, seeing them come closer. Clarke was nowhere in sight, though Madi was still here. “Are you okay?”

“Well, for now actually,” Monty answered.

“Were you the only ones that came through?” he asked.

“No, there are others,” Harper answered. “Sometime after everyone else came back to the wasteland, one came back from the gorge. Something about some ultimatum.”

“If you aren’t the only ones, why is it just the two of you here?” he asked, confusion heavy.

“They are still being processed,” Monty answered. “Some of them are in the gas station. I doubt Miller will be happy that Jackson bought him here. He thinks that we can still win even if the other side practically called it.”

Miller. One of the original hundred who became fanatically loyal to Octavia during the six years in the bunker. Miller, who had an anti-Grounder sentiment before then, became loyal to a society that was basically general Grounder Culture on steroids.

(And that would explain Clarke’s absence. As she was probably helping her mom with some of the injured).

“Though I’m not surprised that like only fifty decided on option three,” Harper continued. “All thanks to your sister being some tyrant.”

Only fifty. Bad news for Wonkru, as McCreary would be getting what he wants. Though it would be good news for McCreary, as it would give him fewer people to worry about controlling.

Good news for McCreary as he would take comfort that his faction of hardened criminals would be the majority.

“Anything happen since you came?” Monty asked him.

“Raven and the inmate’s pilot got caught when they and Echo tried to get Madi to the gorge,” he answered. “Echo was sent to retrieve the rest of our friends.”

He left out the part where they got caught because Clarke’s mic was open, as he didn’t want to fuel whatever resentment they might have towards her. Personally, he couldn’t bring himself to be furious with Clarke for selling out their friends. It was like she suspected that they might try to sneak Madi to the gorge after everything that happened in Polis.

Clarke thought that she was protecting Madi from certain death. He knew he couldn’t blame her for that. Speaking of which, what the hell were Raven and Echo thinking? To want to spirit a twelve-year-old to the gorge where she could get killed? He thought Raven of all people knew better.

“With Raven and their pilot, they are going to use their missiles to rush the process,” he continued. “Unless you have an idea of how to stop it.”

Their hesitation was answer enough. “By the looks of these guys, they are probably genre savvy to the point of figuring out what we would be up to,” Monty answered. “Even if we tried saving them, it’s only going to end with him winning the war or worse.”

“He called it the moment his men fired upon Wonkru,” Bellamy pointed out.

Unlike with Mount Weather, unlike with A.L.I.E, they were screwed. Though knowing Monty, just because they weren’t going to do something now, they weren’t going to do something later. Monty wasn’t one to give up.

As for the nagging question in his brain –

“Anything about Octavia?”

“We don’t know, but apparently, we heard some Eligius mooks whispering excitedly or something about a ‘big fish,’” answered Harper. “It could be anything but…”

If Octavia was here, that was the last thing he wanted. As she would die.

* * *

Even if she wasn’t surprised, Clarke was still hurt by Niylah’s cold reception when she came to the gas station with Jackson to treat some of the wounded; Miller, one of them. Making it painfully evident that she only chose option three because all their medical supplies at the wasteland ran dry.

She should have been thankful for her silence, but it was worse than her throwing barbs.

Perhaps her siding with McCreary was a line that wasn’t to be crossed.

Her mom was busy tending Kane’s wounds from last night. “Vinson stabbed him with a scalpel,” she was told. “He was going to bite out his throat before I overcharged his collar.”

Vinson. The one that looked like who could have been a librarian or something before his arrest. He still had the collar because he was unpredictable; go from being soft-spoken before attacking you the next, from what she heard.

With Jackson, though, it seemed like nothing had changed. Though maybe it was because he was in his environment as an assistant doctor. Yet he said: “I’m glad you’re here, Clarke.”

It only provided an ounce of comfort.

By daybreak, Clarke excused herself. “I need to put some food in my stomach,” she said. “I’ll be right back.” She hadn’t eaten anything since yesterday morning. In fact, she and her mom had one meal a day as they worked overtime, treating one hundred and twenty-two people out of one hundred and fifty in a matter of five days. Hopefully, that would change.

Her real reason was that it was getting uncomfortable to stand here.

The other inmates were milling about getting their breakfast. With a few groups eagerly gathering around radios, as in anticipation. Instinct drove her to turn her gaze to where the ship was supposed to be.

Only to see it hovering over the sky. Dread filling her stomach, as she knew what was going to happen. After all, it’s what she allowed happen. How many hours of torture did Raven and Shaw endure before one of them broke? Clarke didn’t want to go there.

Clarke turned to the food tent, oblivious to the ruckus from a few miles away. As if more people came. Probably Echo with whoever was in the woods, as only fifty from Wonkru choose the third option that McCreary gave them.

Fifty. Fifty Wonkru to a hundred and fifty Eligius inmates. It seemed to work in McCreary’s favor, as he wouldn’t have liked it if they outmatched the Eligius inmates or had an equal variable.

Then again, weren’t the defectors (specifically the ones that survived Cooper’s sniper shots; only for McCreary to kill them days later) that were under Diyoza’s control just a small sampling of Wonkru? Again, it sadly showed how only the minority dared to defy Octavia. That there were those who would rather have a child lead them.

She picked up a plate of fish and vegetables. Her hands picking up another dish for Madi, who was in the church still when she heard an Earth-shattering _booooom!_ from the radios. The primal cheers from a portion of the prisoners resulting in her to drop her plate.

Clarke blinked the tears away from her eyes, as any grieving for her actions could spell a death sentence here.

And by the next boom, it seemed that maybe those in the wasteland were not safe.

He had technically won yesterday morning, but this morning only cemented his victory.

* * *

Even if his announcement over the P.A systems disclosed the fact on what was to come, Charmaine Diyoza didn’t want to dwell on the fact. If she could, she could touch her swollen stomach out of reflex. As if he predicted that she might kill herself to deny him their daughter, he had her restrained upon being locked up.

Their. Diyoza chuckled to herself. There was no “We” and “Their” between the two of them. Even when Graveyard handed over control of his faction to her when they mutinied against those slavers for the wretched Eligius Corporation.

Then again, they only had sex with each other as they both thought it was a better alternative to killing each other. With McCreary forgetting to pull out in time, which most likely led to her daughter’s conception.

She was her daughter. Not his, not anyone else’s.

_How are you going to feed her?_ She was prepared to ask, though he might have an answer for that one. Blended vegetables and fruit would serve as an alternative to formula. And due to the recent events, maybe force nursing mothers to share their milk.

McCreary was no strategist, but he was no idiot. Hitler was no strategist, and he was in power for twelve years.

When she felt the hovercraft descend, Diyoza jolted when she heard the beep of her door before it slid open. Nausea curdling her stomach at the smirk, curling his lips.

The smirk of someone who got what they wanted.

“I am sure that there are others that you gloat to regarding your victory,” she retorted. “Why not Dani? She’s the go-to person.”

“Dani is not one that would sit through it,” he answered. “She is already pissed at me for broadcasting the shootout at the gorge. Anyways, that’s not why I am here.”

_Shit_ , she thought, as she could feel the reason why he was coming. Especially after she and Kane convinced him to at least give Wonkru the option of surrendering on the condition that they help the Eligius miners rebuild and become one of them in exchange for their cooperation.

“I was thinking…” McCreary sits a few feet away from her. “Since I gave those savages a third option as well as giving one to Clarke’s friends, I might as well give you one. It wouldn’t be fair for Bianca if – ”

“Bianca?” she asked, raising her eyebrow. She should have known that he would come up with something else.

“After Dani’s sister that I had with Sarah,” he clarified with a scoff, “though I shouldn’t have to repeat the story of her untimely death, as I let it slip after one of our past encounters.”

Oh, yes. Sex was very good at letting people lower their defenses and tell people things that they wouldn’t usually tell them. His youngest from the time before died at fifteen from bone cancer. It made her understand why he desired (and had) his surviving daughter cured before him and before everyone else affected by their lung illness caused by the toxic shit.

Diyoza didn’t say anything. She was too pregnant to say the wrong thing to an shark like him.

“Now, if you agree to not be so resistant and work with me instead, you’ll be able to live, see our daughter grow up.” He pauses. “Maybe be a family.”

He did that. Oh, the possibilities this option could come with. Why she would be able to formulate a plan to ruin him. Yeah, he won, though if a villain wins, it should only last for a short amount of time.

Though she shouldn’t accept it right off the bat. It will only be suspicious, not to mention idiotic.

“I would rather attempt to slice my throat again then to be a family with you,” she spat out. Those words weren’t a lie. Death was better than be a family with him.

McCreary scoffed as if that didn’t surprise him. “Be my guest, though you’re unable to.” He eyed her restrained wrists with satisfaction before standing up. “I’ll give you until your ninth month to change your mind and believe me, that time comes fast. Besides, I have an execution to carry out.”

It was when he left when her lips curled into a smirk. After all, wasn’t overthrowing or attempting to overthrow tyrants her calling?

* * *

They wanted a doctor to tend to Shaw when they landed. Clarke volunteered as her mom, Jackson, and Niylah were preoccupied. McCreary was planning to display a execution to demonstrate his victory, and she wasn’t up to seeing it.

_Whoever he is executing, save them_ , her mind urged her.

It was a temptation, though it would mean that her mom and Madi would die. And she couldn’t have that. Besides, treating Shaw might be a way to make up to him for selling him and Raven out to McCreary.

She carried the handle of her work bag as she walked towards the holding cell that McCreary said they were at. Swallowing hard as her blood pounded in her fingertips. At her destination, the Eligius mooks didn’t ask questions about her presence. For one of them unlocked the door.

As if they were aware that she was coming.

The doors slid open, and she walked in; heart aching as she watched Raven putting a cloth to Shaw’s mouth. And when she turned her gaze, Clarke froze; cringing when she saw the condemnation and hatred in Raven’s eyes.

“You have the nerve to come in here,” Raven seethed as she stood up. Fists balled. “Trying to make yourself feel better after I was forced to do something terrible.”

“Raven, I – ” Clarke could barely get a sentence out when the back of Raven’s hand struck her. Eyes watering up and ears ringing from the force of it.

“Because of you, I had to launch the missiles on our people at the gorge,” Raven spat out, voice shaking from anger and tears. “I was forced to launch missiles on our friends in the wasteland. Was Madi’s life worth sacrificing Harper’s and Monty’s? What about Niylah? Their lives were worth saving too.”

“I…” Clarke’s words failed her before realizing she had something. “I saw Niylah. She’s fine. So if they are okay, Monty and Harper should be too.”

“And that still makes your selfishness, okay?” Raven demanded. “What you did was selfish and unforgivable. I hate you.”

“Raven,” Shaw rasped where he was lying. “Let her through, please.”

Raven continued to glare at her before she nodded, allowing Clarke to approach the bench where he was lying. It didn’t take long for Clarke to see what needed attention first, as the fabric of his pants was basically torn. “Let’s see what we got here,” she said to herself as she ripped the fabric, eyes widening as she saw the gash around his leg. Dark red blood running from where the laceration was. “I got to clean this and close the wound before this gets infected. What happened?”

She heard Raven huff in annoyance.

“He was trying to crush one my legs if Raven or I didn’t…well let’s just say that the past week forced us to do questionable things,” said Shaw.

Clarke swallowed. Perhaps finding a solution and stopping the bad guy (which onetime meant killing innocent people) was not going to happen all the time. Maybe the bad guy was expected to win here.

If Octavia won, it would be bad as well. Choosing either side was akin to taking a spoonful of arsenic and eating it like sugar. For Clarke, siding with Octavia meant putting Madi on the front lines. Madi becoming Commander for even just a short time would mean her death. As messed up as it was, being on McCreary’s side meant that Madi could live.

It took an hour for her to clean and stitch his wound. Wrapping a bandage around it before putting a gauze where the teeth sockets were bleeding. “Someone should check on you later,” Clarke said. “Hopefully by tomorrow morning or this afternoon, you two should be out of here.”

Raven muttered something under her breath, and Clarke could swear that one of them was “Go float yourself.” She swallowed back tears as she left the holding cell block. Perhaps, if she saw Wells, maybe she can talk to him. As things were tense between her and Bellamy as it was.

Descending the ramp into the midmorning rain, Clarke thought about finding Madi too. They could use some time together as well. For who knows what McCreary has planned for her as she was a significant contributor to him wiping out most of Wonkru and getting the valley.

It was when she stepped into the entrance of the place where she and Madi called home for six years and seven days, was when she saw it. Clarke froze on the spot, horror, and grief filling her. The latter for the look on devastation on Bellamy’s face as his knees touched the mud.

Where the body of his sister lay; blood pooling around her head.


	2. Chapter Two

Throughout the morning, more people were filtering into the church. All wearing shock collars; though Bellamy heard that more were outside. That the inmates were pitching up a housing tent that they said was temporary.

He had searched the throngs of people, looking to see if Indra and Gaia were among them. At first disappointment and dread sunk in. That they were killed by the missiles, though when Niylah came in, he asked her, “Indra? Gaia?”

Niylah only had to answer by lowering her head, and a horrifying reality seeded to the seed of his stomach. He did not want to imagine them dying from their wounds or vaporized by the missiles. They were dead because of his sister’s bloodlust and hunger for power.

They didn’t deserve that fate.

“ _Yo gonplei ste odon_ ,” he says under his breath. Though, he didn’t have enough time to reflect on his feelings on the matter.

“Bellamy!”

“Echo!” he shouted, running towards her and folding her into an embrace. She had come. She was safe. And they were joined by some of their friends that were hiding in the valley.

“Never thought I would return here,” Murphy retorted. “Then again, throwing people under the bus is just a regular Tuesday for Clarke.”

“Like stealing for self-preservation is for you?” Roan countered. “Don’t act as if you and Raven didn’t orchestrate the riot that put this tyrant in power in the first place.”

“What?” Monty asked as Niylah’s eyes widened. “The riot you mentioned was caused by you?”

“We tried to talk him out of it,” Wells stressed as Madi came forward. “But this idiot went ahead with it, even when Roan and I explained the most likely outcome.”

The main doors swung open; resulting in a fraction of the room to gasp and mutter in fear. “My dad wants all of you to come outside, as he says he has a final act to play out.” Bellamy could tell that Dani was not happy by all appearances. As if this was something that she did not want to happen. Her eyes turned to the few children gathered in the church, Madi included, and muttered something under her breath. “If I had my way, all kids would be exempt. But dad was insistent they see this too.”

Whatever it was, it was most likely going to be horrific. Bellamy instinctively hovered close to Madi, yet Dani gave another bombshell, “And dad said something about you, in his words, not mine, about you getting a front row seat for this.”

A horror like none other settled into his stomach.

_Please, don’t let it be true. Please let it be something else._

Yet, what else could it be if they were talking about a ‘big fish’ hours earlier? He wanted to make sure that this wouldn’t happen.

That she be safe.

As if they saw his hesitation, the Eligius mooks with Dani grabbed him by his arms and pulled him out before proceeding with his friends and others. Outside, most of the inmates were concentrated in a circle, with a few milling about their business as if what was happening wasn’t worth their interest.

Dani wedged through the crowd, and within moments, he heard McCreary shout, “Make some room for our newcomers! Also, give Loverboy the front row seat!”

The sadistic enthusiasm in McCreary’s voice had Bellamy swallow back bile as he was passed through the crowd of inmates. Horror filling every fiber of his being when he saw who it was kneeling on the mud.

“O!” he exclaimed, reaching towards her. Only to be restrained by another pair of McCreary’s lackies.

“I keep your distance if I were you,” McCreary threatened, turning towards him. “Unless you want to join her.”

At that moment, resistance faded from him. It had faded because killing the both of them would only give McCreary satisfaction. And by the looks of it, killing both him and Octavia would be as if Christmas came.

“Bellamy, please,” Octavia pleaded. “Don’t.”

At that moment, she wasn’t Blodreina, the Red Queen of the Second Dawn Bunker. She wasn’t what the Grounders referred to as the Skairippa before the Death Wave. She was afraid, yet accepting of this.

As if this was what she had planned.

McCreary searched his face for an indication of an argument before he turned his attention to the survivors of Wonkru. All of them horrified to do anything. If any of the fanatically loyal were here, they were most likely getting treated.

“Well, then,” the monster surmised. “Let’s get the show started then.”

As if it was entertainment. What a sick, twisted –

“Do you have anything to say before I end this?” he asked her.

“Not for you,” Octavia muttered before she looked up at the sky and her lips read, “ _I am coming, Lincoln. We will meet again_.”

Bellamy could feel himself tremble as he watched his sister. No, he wasn’t going to accept it. No, Octavia, no. She might have threatened him, might have been unhinged but he didn’t want this to happen.

 _No, Octavia_ **!** He mouthed as she nodded to her executioner. Without a blink and without a flinch, McCreary put a round into her head.

At that moment, it was like he became nothing but gelatin. The ringing of his ears replacing the cheers by the majority of the Eligius miners save for a few who were either indifferent or failing in masking their disgust with indifference, with Dani as the latter.

Bellamy felt his knees give way as he heard McCreary say something before the crowd dissipates. It wasn’t clear, but it was to the effect of leaving his sister’s corpse out here for some time, along with something else that he didn’t care to decipher. Sobs began to shake his body as his shaking hand moved to her eyes.

He remembered six years ago when he thought Octavia died. How sobs shook his body as his fingers grasped the bars of the cell that contained him and Kane. Only this time, it was real, and the emotions were more pronounced.

“I’m so sorry, O,” he sobbed. “I’m so sorry.”

Only a few of the crowd remained. Mainly composed of friends, surviving members of Wonkru, and a handful of seemingly sympathetic inmates, though the third group didn’t stay long. He could feel both Echo and Wells place their hands on his shoulder, and he grasped the former.

Bellamy was dimly aware of Clarke approaching him. Her eyes glassy as she looked on with regret and somberness. It was as if she too couldn’t say anything.

Like she felt like she was responsible. Even when she wasn’t.

Yet, Bellamy forced himself to his feet. Not taking his eyes off Octavia’s body.

“Madi, it’s okay,” he could hear Clarke say from a few feet away. “I’m right here.”

Through his devastated haze, Bellamy felt disgust curdle his stomach. What was the point of having children see this? To scare them into submission, that’s why. They are all going to have nightmares because of this sick bastard.

Who was now talking at the perch of the church.

“…Just don’t cause problems, and everything will be okay,” he could hear him say. “We’ll all be one big happy crowd. Those that contributed greatly to today’s outcome will be rewarded.”

Bellamy’s eyes fell on Clarke at those words. What will McCreary do with her? Put her in his inner circle? Give her a position where she will work closely with him? He himself worked closely with Pike after he gained his trust by arming his team to massacre the Trikru army.

But the main difference between Pike and McCreary was the latter’s thirst for pain and blood. Whereas Pike lacked it.

From the corner of his eye, he could see Clarke glare at him as she clung to Madi. Hopefully, he doesn’t see it.

Half an hour later, they burn her body. At first, Bellamy was surprised, as McCreary wasn’t one to respect burial rites (Even if Octavia wasn’t Trikru, she basically assimilated with them and became one of them). Though maybe it has more to do with the fact that there was a year that Wonkru ate their dead.

Like he feared that the survivors might go crazy and eat her body. Or dig up her body for some other fanatical reason.

Tears glistened in his eyes as the heat of the flames licked his face. Echo and their friends standing somberly beside them.

“May We Meet Again, O,” he mouthed.

* * *

“Well, didn’t shit hit the fan,” groaned Dani.

“To be honest, it happened when that riot started,” Wells pointed out.

He had tried talking them out of it. Even Roan, who came with Echo when the Wonkru defectors arrived at the valley, had tried. Stressing that if they got their riot, it would end with Diyoza dead and McCreary in power. In addition, after Murphy admitted to telling McCreary about the cure, Dani tried going to her own dad to try to douse the flames, but even she didn’t succeed; as indicated that the two factions stared down each other before Murphy threw that rock.

“We have an long, bumpy ride ahead of us,” Dani pointed out. “With my psycho of an dad in charge…well, might as well go to my workshop.”

Wells watches as Dani leaves his side. Not withdrawing his gaze as she leaves the church.

“Be careful,” Roan warned. “Her father might try to gut you if he saw her looking at her like that.”

Even if there would be some truth to Roan’s warning, Wells figured that McCreary already was aware that some sort of bond had formed anyway. Maybe he expected it since Dani literally went between him and her dad when he was trying to see who killed his friend Kodiak (or prized lackey, Wells liked to say).

“I’m sorry,” she apologized as she tended to his wounds on that day “If I had my way, he wouldn’t be such an psycho maniac who gets hard from pain.”

“It’s not your fault,” he assured her.

During the week before the riot, she would sometimes invite him to her workshop. While he shared some stories about both his time on the Ark and the Ring, she’d told him about her life from the time before the bombs: living in Long Island, being one of three siblings (with bone cancer taking an sister), how her mom was chemist for the very same corporation that had her and the other inmates mine toxic fuel, etc.

After the riot, she went to their cave the first time to give them food and another to tell them that her dad knows that Wonkru is on the move. That second trip being the last one.

“Please, I don’t want you to risk your life coming here,” Wells had stressed to her after Echo’s correspondence with Bellamy. “What’s not to say that the third time, he’ll send someone to follow you to see where you’re going?”

Raven had insinuated that maybe McCreary did not need someone to follow her as he probably tasked Dani to look for them. Then again, Dani and Raven seemed to not like each other. With Dani’s dislike of Raven beginning ever since that incident with Shaw, as she went between them when Raven approached Shaw after he was tortured by Eligius miners for the fun of it.

In the present, Wells shrugged. “Well, he knows that she likes me,” he says. "It's not like it's an secret."

* * *

Not long after Octavia was cremated, Clarke received a summons. That he’ll have to talk to her on the hovercraft.

“Clarke, if he…” Madi begins, the blood drained from her face.

“I’ll see you,” Clarke assured, placing a kiss on her forehead. “Don’t worry. I’ll be there for lunch.”

If McCreary hadn’t said something about rewarding those that contributed to him getting the valley, she would be worried. Clarke wasn’t the only one; her mom, Kane, and Diyoza played their parts. But she was the one who told McCreary that the Eye was down and that they had a week to prepare.

She contributed big, and there was no doubt that he was going to give her something big.

When she ascended the ramp, confusion stirred in her when she saw Murphy was behind her. What role did he play?

“What did you do?” she asked as they were led to a holding cell. Probably to wait for McCreary.

Murphy snorted. “Diyoza didn’t tell him about the cure, so I told him,” he said. “But it’s nothing like what you did.”

“Why…” she began before thinking about what that might entail. Telling McCreary about information that Diyoza kept from him only had one outcome: chaos. “Were you an idiot? Telling him would have started a riot that would have forced Diyoza into hiding or killed her and leaving McCreary in charge.”

“That was the point, as we wanted a distraction so we could get out of here,” he scoffed.

“And how is it nothing like what I did?” she demanded. “You basically put him in power.”

“It was to get my friends out of here,” he justified. “Where you, on the other hand, put them in a situation where they would get killed.”

Clarke wanted to tell him that what she did was no different than him. That it was to ensure Madi’s safety. To not have her die in this war. To make sure her own mom lived. But something told her that it would be pointless to reason with Murphy, as he would accuse her justifying her actions.

She swallowed her tears when the door slid open. “You’re first,” she’s told.

Why didn’t that surprise her? Clarke lifts herself from the bench and follows her escort out of the holding cells. She wasn’t afraid of what he might do to her, as that was the least of her worries.

Upon passing through the doors to the bridge, McCreary looks up from the notebook in his position. Which he closes shut with one hand.

“You don’t look happy,” he observed.

“I’m never happy after something like this,” she answered before she could stop herself. Realizing that she opened a doorway for him to enter and exploit.

“Then we are no different after all.” He takes a step forward, and Clarke stands her ground. “Two birds of a feather is what we are.”

“Only I did what I did because no other options were off the table,” she persisted. “Nor do I seem to enjoy it.”

It seems that his sadism was pointed out to him many times before, for he only smirks. “We all have a reason,” he justified. “We both had the same reasons for our decisions: I wanted a better life for my daughter and unborn daughter, and you wanted to prevent yours from leading those savages. And here we are.”

Clarke swallowed, struggling not to digest what he said. Even if the temptation was there to swallow it up.

_You are nothing like him, Clarke._

“Now,” he starts before cutting into her thoughts. Speaking before she could say anything, “as you brought it to my attention that the Eye was down and that you helped your mom cure us, there are a few open slots in my inner circle.”

“And what can I do for you?” she asked, wondering what he has in mind. Even if it shouldn’t have surprised her.

“I am not like Diyoza in terms of strategy, but I am aware that leading on this piece of land is not the same as leading a faction of inmates aboard a corporate slaver’s ship,” was his answer. “In other words, that’s where you come in. You help me maintain order over my enforcers, give me input to avoid any problems…” he pauses, as if thinking of ways to deter any doubt, “not to mention it would have the perk of ensuring the safety of your mom, daughter, friends…”

He did that. Told her that working closely with him would ensure that her mom, Madi, Bellamy, Wells, and everyone else that she cares about would be safe. Though he didn’t need to say that to make her decision for the benefit for her friends.

Clarke had full intention to take up on his offer.

All he had to do was lock her in, and he did just that.

“Would it be too much if I ask if I could start now?” she asked.

“Not if you have something good to offer,” was his answer.

Clarke swallowed, as whatever she will suggest will keep him in power. Yet, she didn’t want her friends miserable. “You want to stay in power? Give these people the benefit of having them know when their next meal is coming from,” she offered.

Even if people were miserable, some tyrants remained in power by keeping the masses fed. Less hungry people meant less motivation for an uprising. She didn’t want to give him the ammunition of keeping his power, but if she wanted to convince him that she was on his side…

“Not a terrible idea,” he mused. “We don’t need to give these people more ammunition against me, do we?”

* * *

Murphy didn’t see Clarke after she was called, but it didn’t hurt his feelings any. She didn’t defend herself the last time because she knew what he said was true. But she’ll always justify it later on in Clarke fashion.

“I had no choice” or some bullshit like that. McCreary didn’t force her to side with him. He didn’t force her to sell out Raven, Shaw, and Echo. She did all those things on her own.

Murphy gritted his teeth as he walked from the holding cell. Wondering why he was rewarded alongside Clarke anyway. Telling him about the cure wasn’t as big as Clarke selling out their friends.

“Take that off of him, will you?” McCreary asked one of his lackeys in the room after Murphy walked in. “He won’t be needing that.”

One of the Eligius inmates unlatched the collars around his neck within seconds. “Thanks,” he retorted.

She raised her thin eyebrows and retorted, “For sure.”

“I don’t understand how me telling you about the cure was a big contribution,” Murphy pointed out.

“No need to be modest, Murphy,” he said. “Had you not let slip about Diyoza’s deception, this place would be overrun with her precious savages. You played as big as a part as Clarke. Don’t kid yourself.”

Even if he played a big part, his actions only risked himself and not others.

“It wasn’t a stretch a week ago when I said that I could use someone like you in my crew,” McCreary continued. “To dispose of you would be a waste of your talents, not to mention that I’m not the ungrateful type.”

“There are no more enemies for you, so what’s the use of me?” Murphy retorted.

“True, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t have you mine the radius around this valley,” he surmised. “Besides, someone needs to help keep their friends in line.”

Land mines. How resourceful. Saves bullets and manpower, and Murphy guesses that was his intention. As for his other offer, well, saying no to a psychopathic sadist is not an option. Besides, that would mean that he could help his friends avoid any enforcers sadistic as McCreary. Ensure Emori’s protection this way.

“When do you want me to start?” he asked.

* * *

Heading off to join lunch with Madi, Clarke saw that Raven and Shaw must have been freed earlier, as she saw the former being accompanied by Dani and her companions. Perhaps McCreary placed her with his eldest daughter’s group of prisoners as a reward for launching the missiles.

Given the shock collar around her neck, he probably didn’t trust her. Most likely because she did it under duress. Fortunately, Raven didn’t pay any mind to her.

Perhaps that was a good thing as she wouldn’t be throwing barbs, but maybe her silence was worse. Even if Raven didn’t glare at her, there were a few surviving members of Wonkru that did. As if they resented and blamed her for their current situation.

Entering the church, she noticed cots strewn along the sides of the church. Less than fifty when she counted. As the inmates were building a structure behind the church, the church itself wouldn’t be the only place where they would reside for the moment.

Madi ran up to hug her, only for Wells to come and hug Clarke as well when they were done hugging. At least one still cares for her, though it was painful.

When she thought that Wells betrayed her and sold out her father, she treated him horribly. Whereas in the event she sided with a sadistic sociopath because it meant that Madi could live and when Wells could have died as a result, he was still there for her.

She didn’t deserve him.

“It’s good to see you, Clarke,” he greeted.

“It’s good to see you too, Wells,” she murmurs.

Bellamy was there, but he was picking at his food rather than eating it. With his sister being executed in front of him, Clarke wasn’t surprised.

“So, Murphy started the riot that placed him in power?” Monty asked as Clarke sat down with her plate.

“And he and Raven still went ahead even as Wells, and I stressed the outcome.” Roan snorted. “Not caring if Clarke and Bellamy were coming up with a peace plan.”

“It would have been pointless anyway as _Blodreina_ never would have surrendered,” Echo justified, not missing a chance to side glare at Clarke.

“But you didn’t need to escalate the tensions within these people either,” Wells pointed out.

“You could have killed him and staged it to look like an accident,” Harper suggested.

“Murphy should have killed him when he and Emori held him hostage,” said Roan. “That was his chance, and thanks to him, we have an tyrant at the helm.”

“Still, we had to get back to our friends.” Emori looks at Clarke. “Friends that she allowed to be tortured.”

“So, Monty, Harper, what happened in the Bunker for the past few days?” Wells asked. Clarke was grateful for Wells’ intervention, even as Bellamy himself clenched his fist as if in response to Emori’s remark.

Monty and Harper go on a tangent about everything: Monty hacking into the Eye, killing Kara Cooper in an attempt to stop the war…

“I was able to revive the Hydroponics farm with algae,” Monty continued wistfully. “I could have used it to revive the irradiated soil in Polis.”

There was something about his face, his tone, that suggested that it did not go down as he hoped.

“If you came up with the algae solution, then why did _Blodreina_ march everyone to a war that she knew she would lose?” Roan asked.

“She burned it,” Harper answered, that shadow of anger visible on her face. “It could have been avoided, but it seems that she valued her power over the lives of people.”

Monty found a solution. A solution where Shallow Valley wouldn’t be the only necessity to _Wonkru_. And Octavia destroyed that…she marched her people to their deaths. Madi looked at her plate as if she herself didn’t know what to say.

She had idolized Octavia from all the stories she heard. It was probably hard to comprehend to her that Octavia would put her people in a position where they would be dependent on her.

Clarke drifted her gaze to Bellamy. She bit her lip, wondering where to proceed. Clarke had to say something, as earlier she couldn’t bring herself to. She took a deep breath before crossing over to where he was sitting.

Where to begin, Clarke, she thought. Where to begin.

“Bellamy, I’m sorry,” she said, and she wanted to leave it at that. As anything else would be pushing it or make it worse between them.

Bellamy exhales. “I tried for the past week to prevent this,” he said. “And look where it got me.”

It was apparent that he held himself responsible, not her. That he thought it was his fault that things ended the way it did for Octavia. “Don’t beat yourself over it, Bellamy,” Clarke managed. “Sometimes we all wish that…” she trailed off, as she couldn’t figure what appropriate things to say.

Perhaps it was best for her to leave him alone for a while, as it was her own actions that helped this incident come to fruition. Even if Octavia leading her people to war was also a significant contributing factor.

Clarke left his side and returned to where she was sitting. She hated how everything had become tense for them. Tense for them to carry a normal conversation.

And it might only get worse with her playing second fiddle to McCreary. Playing second fiddle meant a change in sleeping quarters, as she packed her and Madi’s things, though that it was when she explained their situation to Madi.

“Do you have to?” Madi asked as Clarke put the last thing in her bag.

Of course, Madi would have reservations about this. Reservations about their parental figure working closely with someone perceived to be dangerous.

“I know it’s not ideal, but that means I can keep a close eye on him so that he won’t hurt you or anyone else,” she answered.

“But, he’ll kill you one of these days if we’re not careful,” Madi premised.

Clarke remembered when she wanted to join the defectors to the valley, and that Madi feared that Diyoza would kill her upon arrival. Just like back then, Madi was afraid that she would get killed as a result. Both were valid fears.

“It might be rough for us in the days to come, but we have each other,” Clarke assured. “That’s what matters.”

Her own mom verbally wished that things had to get better. Even if McCreary didn’t starve them, that doesn’t leave out the fact that things would be uncomfortable for them.

Above the holding cells and inmate berths, was where the berths for the former overseeing officers were located. And Clarke guessed that he slept in the one labeled _Main Overseeing Officer_ on the door.

Perhaps it should have made her uncomfortable that her and Madi’s accommodations were so close to his.

* * *

That night, Bellamy was plagued by the same image: McCreary executing Octavia, her lifeless body falling to the mud, her lifeless eyes opened before he closed them.

Yet, they each had an additional factor. Bellamy would turn to see Octavia behind him. The bullet wound in her head as she glared at him before proceeding to lunge at him. At one instance she strangled him and another time she impaled him with a sword; in the matter in which she killed Pike in. 

When a blaring noise of a siren pierced into his sleep, he shivered. Even if dead, the thought of Octavia killing him for not saving her (even if she didn’t want him to intervene) haunted him.

It was dark outside, with a hint of blue. Giving away the indication that this would be a nice day weather-wise. How ironic with all the destruction from the day before. He heard from Niylah that Miller would be released from the gas station today.

“We might want to keep tabs on him,” Wells whispered. “He might want to try to avenge Octavia.”

Bellamy didn’t want to admit it, but it was true. Miller would be reckless enough to get himself tortured or killed for trying to stir trouble.

Heading to the makeshift mess hall, Bellamy saw a line of disgruntled Eligius inmates placing their guns or weapons in crates.

“He’s disarming his own people?” Raven asked, raising one of her eyebrows incredulously. As if the idea was beyond comprehension.

For Bellamy, it made sense. McCreary had taken power from Diyoza the previous week, and he destroyed a majority of Wonkru to achieve the valley. He probably didn’t want to risk backstabbers among his own faction and would only trust guns to those in his inner circle and his enforcers.

Though the sight of the Eligius inmates being disarmed was eclipsed when he saw two other Eligius inmates working on fixing a pole to the ground. With one of them attaching chains to it.

“Oh nice,” Murphy retorted from behind. “Don’t tell me that I have to flog someone.”

Around dinner time last night, Murphy went about how he was selected to be one of the enforcers here. Not only that but to “tighten security around the valley” as well.

“I’m not supposed to tell, but he has me, and a few others install land mines around the valley,” Murphy whispered. “Don’t tell others that I told you.”

Land mines. A way to reduce firepower and manpower for “security.” A bloodier way to go. And Bellamy had half a mind to warn people. That there were mines around the valley, though doing that would only jeopardize Murphy.

Bellamy and his friends gathered around in a small circle to eat breakfast. A few feet away, Bellamy could see Clarke walking down the path between the buildings and shanties. Carrying something rolled up.

“What is she up to?” Emori asked.

“I hate to find out," Raven retorts, not taking her eyes off of Clarke as she goes under a marquee. Unrolls the paper and begins talking.

The simple fact that the four people were listening to her without an argument was enough for Bellamy to guess what reward McCreary gave her.

“Playing second fiddle,” said Murphy, ending it with a snort. “As long as she’s brought down a peg it’s fine with me.”

“Can you please shut up?” Wells agitated. “You don’t know her motives for agreeing to being his right hand.”

Wells was right. They didn’t know. If anything, concern eclipsed any other reaction that Bellamy must have had. The idea of Clarke working closely with a monster like McCreary was unsettling. Clarke could protect herself, she wasn’t weak but who knows what McCreary might be salivating over the prospect of this.

“Sometimes one of our own working closely with the other party might be in our favor,” Roan mused.

It might be, but that didn’t alleviate the concern he had for her.

* * *

When Abby was going to see off the last few patients, she was going to crash. Even with Jackson’s and Niylah’s help, she was dead on her feet.

“You should rest, Abby,” Jackson suggested a few hours ago. “It looks like you haven’t gotten much sleep.”

“I will after the last patient leaves,” Abby promised him. When she saw off Miller, told him to be careful, she sat by the table where Marcus lay and rested her head on his legs. She took off the nitrous oxide mask after giving him oxygen, as he was stable.

_I need it to get better_ , were her words to Clarke two days ago; when she was curing the hundredth and twenty-second subject. She didn’t want to cure them. A few days ago, Abby swore that she rather die from withdrawal then cure McCreary and his fellow convicts; even if it wasn’t fair to the few that seemed rehabilitated and wanted to make up for their crimes. However –

“If she still won’t cure us, then I guess you both get to watch your daughters die,” were his words according to Clarke. Because of that, refusing to cure him wouldn’t have been fair to Clarke and Madi.

She cured them, and he got what he wanted, but what waited for her when Diyoza has the baby? Will he kill her then? It was a possibility since he killed Eligius’ Med Tech for not knowing what their illness was.

However, it was like her gut was telling her that she would live beyond that. That she wouldn’t be just needed to deliver the baby. Her gut feeling better be right.

They always say to trust your gut. She had to live.

It was the sound of Marcus rousing from his sleep that stirred her. “Abby?” he rasped.

Marcus!

“Marcus!” she exclaimed out loud, relief filling her. Her hands framing his face. She wasn’t going to allow him to try to leave her in this matter again. Though their circumstances might make it a challenge.

* * *

_McCreary works quick_ , were Clarke’s thoughts when she saw a couple of Eligius inmates working on what could only be a whipping post. Evidenced by the chains attached to it. Even if it didn’t surprise her, it disturbed her still.

She turned her attention back to the Marquee, where a few people were waiting for her. Kane had managed to lay out a serious of maps for the valley before the riot. Maps that she recovered in the gas station upon her return.

The plans were drawn out, now they had to build it. The nature of her gathering being instructions to the assigned unit leaders. Even if Clarke would have been worried, these people were the least of them.

“Among the maps that Kane drew out, I am certain that this is your first priority,” she divulged, unrolling the map of the western quadrant. Which consisted outlines of what looked like residential housing. Housing that McCreary might designate for himself and others among his inner circle. “As I’m sure that starting with housing is our first priority.”

“At least we won’t be sleeping in the bunk blocks,” someone said from beside her. “And there aren’t too many of them.”

“And it seems that you don’t have many silver tarps for tents, either,” Clarke registered. “He wants a gathering of supplies and building to start after breakfast…”

“Of course,” someone muttered from a radius. Though no arguments were made when it was finalized (though one woman, Tabitha Gellert, rolled her eyes every time she had spoken). Clarke rolled the maps up in their makeshift tubes after the presentation. Now she was going to get herself and her mom breakfast, as she had encouraged Madi to eat a few minutes earlier.

That is, what will be left of it. As it will be bound to be picked over. Yet, it wasn’t like she and mom didn’t live with limited choices up in the ark.

Though she managed to prepare plates from the things that she could salvage; as the others were called to work formations. Yet, she second-guessed herself to bring breakfast to her mom and Kane when she thought she could spot McCreary walking through the encampment; with Miller looking at him like he was going to throttle him.

_Stay here, Clarke_ , one piece of her mind advised her. _Make sure that he doesn’t do anything stupid_.

_His friends are out there_ , the other part rationalized. _They’ll stop him_.

She wanted to agree with the latter, but the former was more desperate. After all, didn’t she agree to this position to make sure her friends were safe? She was going to quickly drop off the breakfast plates before going outside.

Even if she could be wrong, it was best to be there to diffuse the situation. Even if it was fruitless. Walking into the gas station, she could see that Kane was awake.

“Sorry to interrupt, but here’s breakfast,” she offered, setting the plates on the table. Blood pounding in her ears, she turned to leave.

“Clarke, is everything ok?” asked her mom.

She swallowed. “Things won’t be okay if Miller antagonizes McCreary,” she answered.

“You’re actually going to allow a tyrant to take what he wants?” she heard Miller shout outside.

Panic set in when she realized that he was already antagonizing him. No, he was calling for an uprising. That was worse. Ignoring her mom’s calls as she bounded out the door.

“Come on, we can still fight,” Miller shouted. “I know you all got it in you.”

Clarke could sense the frightened onlookers watch as she approached the scene. Jackson tugging on Miller’s arm. “Not now, Nate,” he begged. “Not now.”

“Miller, please,” Clarke begged, standing near them. “This is not what we need right now.”

“I’d listen to your friend here if I were you,” McCreary leered, stroking the remote to the shock collar. “With how you’re acting now, you wouldn’t like where this road ends up.”

It wasn’t just the threat in his words that made Clarke shiver. It was the casual way he spoke them. As if he was enquiring about the weather. As if murder, pain, and suffering were hardwired into his brain.

“Come on, we can all stand up,” Miller called; ignoring her and Jackson; walking towards the crowd. “Bellamy, I heard how he shot your sister in front of you. Are you willing to keep him in power?”

“Miller, stand down,” Bellamy called. “You don’t know what he is capable of.”

“Niylah?” Miller called as Clarke noticed McCreary reach for the remote of the shock collar. Knocking it out of his hand was a strong temptation, but a risky maneuver. One that could threaten the life of her family and those that she loved.

And it was evident that no one was stepping forward. They weren’t going to put themselves in harm’s way. Niylah looked on somberly.

“Miller, no!” Bellamy shouted just as McCreary pressed the button on the shock collar. Clarke jumped as Miller convulsed for a few seconds before falling to the ground. Some of the inmates leering as McCreary began beating down on him.

“Not so tough now, huh?” he sneered before landing a kick to his nose.

“Clarke, do something!” Raven shouted from the crowd.

Clarke bit her lip. It was risky, but she didn’t want McCreary to beat him to death. Letting Miller die and her friends would hate her more than they really do.

“Stop!” she exclaimed. “I think he got the point!”

Instead of arguing or pushing her away; that he called the shots and not her, McCreary grabbed the collar of Miller’s shirt. “Your friend here thinks I should spare you,” he said. “Funny, as I never planned on killing you anyway.”

He throws him to the ground. “Get up,” he gruffly orders. The task wasn’t easy, as Miller struggled to roll to his side. Though two inmates roughly forced him up to his feet.

“He is to walk around this camp and work sites until his ilk gets the message,” McCreary ordered.

“He needs medical attention,” argued her mom, who was standing by the door.

“You will get to play doctor once he’s done with his parade,” McCreary argues without hesitation.

Her mom stood back. Clarke could only guess what was on her mind, as it would be dangerous to say it. That he was a sadist, who cared more about exerting fear and power.

“There is nothing else to see here,” McCreary declared. “Unless you want the same thing to happen to you.”

McCreary beating Miller and making him march was only a taste of what was to come if no one was compliant.


	3. Chapter Three

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so it begins.

From beside her, she could hear Madi breathing heavily. Having raised her for six years, Clarke knew that if Madi breathed heavy before waking with a gasp, that she was having a nightmare.

“Madi, it’s okay,” Clarke assured just as Madi jerked awake in one of the bottom bunks they were sharing. “It was just a nightmare. I’m here. I’m here.”

Madi’s lip quivered; her grey eyes focused on Clarke. “I was her,” Madi panted. “Running into the bedroom to only to feel a pain in my abdomen and Titus pointing a gun at me. Then I fall after looking at you.”

Madi was free from the Flame. Dani had even hacked into it so the Flame could be removed. Clarke would have assumed that the nightmares would end, but in the past week, Madi still had them. Not in the frequency that she endured them with the Flame within her, but she still had them. Every other few nights this time. And that bothered Clarke.

She bit her lip, as it was painful to hear Madi recount the death of Clarke’s lover.

“Just get some sleep, okay?” Clarke replied, failing to hide the fact that her voice was breaking. “I’m here.”

Madi nodded; her eyes wet with tears before tumbling back under the covers. Clarke watched her for a minute. Kissing her forehead before trying to will herself to sleep.

It had been a week since McCreary orchestrated the massacre on Wonkru; a week since fifty scared members of Wonkru surrendered (though Bellamy was far from frightened); a week since the rest of Wonkru was decimated by the missiles; a week since McCreary executed Octavia, finalizing his victory

It has been a week since their new reality began. Most of the valley had been put to work expanding the encampment of what was a Shallow Valley village. One group almost done with their project around the radius of it: land mines fueled with hydrazine.

“It would be wise and not tell anyone else about the mines around the valley,” McCreary told her the day after his side won the war. “I don’t want them to think that I’m bluffing.”

“I doubt it since most of the population here know that you are not one to bluff,” Clarke pointed out.

“Yes, but fifty that remain from that gladiator cult don’t,” he pointed out. “They will be brazen enough to prove me wrong. Watch, one will be gutsy enough to cross over the barrier, and they will find out that way.”

Gladiator cult. That’s what Bellamy referred to it was when they marched through the wasteland after failing to talk Octavia out of taking the route prone to sandstorms. Clarke wondered if McCreary watched a few gladiator movies before his arrest two centuries ago.

As for the survivors of Wonkru to not know him well enough that he wouldn’t bluff, Clarke was reminded of the time when McCreary beat Miller and had him parade around the valley as an example. Miller was limping still though he was better than the previous week. Some of Wonkru might be brazen enough to challenge McCreary’s claims about landmines around the valley. Only leading to a massacre.

And it didn’t help that Miller was still talking about rebellion. “Even after Diyoza told him that not being a strategist would not guarantee that he would be easy to overthrow,” Bellamy told her in the chance she got to see him.

“She said, ‘Look at Hitler? He was just a lowly World War One soldier, and he was able to take over most of continental Europe and be in control for twelve years’,” Wells said.

From what she heard, Monty was put with Dani’s group after he restored the Eye. Knowing Monty, he most likely would see it as an opportunity to start out what he might be planning in terms of rebellion.

After that day where McCreary’s side won, Clarke had have rarely seen people that seemed to still support her. Bellamy, Harper, Monty, Wells, Roan. Either she was on some expedition in the woods with a bunch of criminals or some other thing that McCreary said required her attention, like making sure that the inmates weren’t hoarding food or overseeing the project around the valley. Then at night, she would crash. She would see Madi (who was given menial chores) and her mom during mealtimes; sleep in the same bunk with Madi. Otherwise, most of her time was spent with McCreary and some other criminals; though she wasn’t separated from Raven, Emori, Niylah, Echo, Miller, and whoever of Wonkru resented her for what happened. “Miller hasn’t been walking straight because you failed to do your job and stop it from happening,” were one of Raven’s scathing remarks.

“That is suicide, and you know it,” she pointed out.

“I’d rather you die trying to save Miller from getting jumped then standing there just to save your ass,” Raven retorted. After that, Clarke gave up trying to convince Raven; for it was challenging to get her to understand.

Four days after McCreary took the valley, Diyoza was free from her holding cell and was sent to live with the others. Stripped of the tactical armor that she wore over her mining coveralls from when she first encountered her.

“I offered her an alternative,” McCreary explained to Clarke. “I had my doubts, but she took it. After all, babies do need their mothers. Especially baby girls.”

McCreary’s decision to let Diyoza live baffled her, as she thought that he would kill her after she had the baby. Surely Diyoza would have some ulterior motive to take his offer. Though maybe that’s why he always had her accompanied with one of his faction so she wouldn’t pull something on him.

Then once the baby is born, he would place the shock collar around her neck. Just like the rest of Wonkru, her friends, and those who acted under duress to ensure his victory, like Raven. 

After an hour of trying to force herself to sleep without any success, Clarke carefully removed herself the covers. Gently as to not awaken Madi. She pulled on a pair of slacks and t-shirt from the set of clothes stashed in the side dresser. Clothes formally worn by members of the guards aboard the Eligius IV before that mutiny.

The door to his quarters was closed, but that was no guarantee whether he was asleep or not. Sometimes she would hear McCreary leave his room around two in the morning before returning back to it at night. Closing the door every time. Maybe insomnia came with his sociopathy or maybe all that time mining in space messed up his sleeping schedule.

She slipped into the small mess hall and opened the metal door; glancing at the packaged food that was in the pantry. Clarke randomly pulled one out and reheated it.

Beef and corn pasty. This was probably a meal designated for the prisoners due to its starchy content. And historically, pasties were considered miner’s food.

“There is nothing like getting comfort food in the middle of the night.” She jumped when she heard his voice. Watching as he came into the mess hall. “In fact, getting up during the night and eating a snack was what I did in college.”

Clarke scoffed. She hated his attempts to come off as some ordinary guy even though he was responsible for the deaths of Wonkru. Not to mention that he seemed enjoyed his job as a contract killer for the mob from the time before. “Yeah, college students basically had ramen and hot pocket diet back in time before,” she retorted, hoping to alienate him to back off.

“Don’t kid yourself,” he retorted back as he approached her table. “My grandparents put me in some prestigious college, so the struggling college student didn’t apply to me.”

Grandparents. With his derisive comments about her mom, the guess was easy. “Parents were junkies?” she retorted.

“My mom’s fix was crack,” he answered. “And she went to great lengths to get her fix. According to my records, my dad was her pimp. Because of her addiction, I couldn’t leave the hospital three weeks after I was born.”

His mom snorted cocaine while pregnant with him. At least that made sense after what she read from him.

“I remember reading somewhere about the link between mass murderers and drug-addicted parents,” Clarke said. “Maybe you read it too.”

“Think that you’re cute, don’t you?” he retorted. “Trying to psychoanalyze me as if you’re some prison psychologist.”

“Then why bother telling me anything at all?” she inquired, studying his reaction as if he were a lion that could kill her at any moment for a misstep. This was stupid, but she wasn’t afraid of him.

“Since you work closely with me, might as well share some things about each other,” he justified. “I’m not all that unapproachable.”

Clarke swallowed, knowing the ramifications of sharing everything about her. He already has the idea that she has killed people. Tell him more, and he could use that as ammunition to get what he wants out of her. No, she wasn’t going to fall for that.

“There’s nothing for me to tell you,” she rebuffed, folding her arms.

“That is what they all say in the beginning,” he retorted.

* * *

“One last beam for this food store and then we should do the rest,” Dani McCreary said as she tied two pieces of wood together.

“You really get a kick out of just being bossy, don’t you?” Roan asked her. “I wonder where you got that from.”

Dani shrugged. “Everyone accuses me of being bossy,” she answers. “My last name doesn’t help any.”

In the week that had passed since that rainy day where Octavia died, Bellamy saw that Dani was quite a decent person. Not one to throw her weight around, and if Wells was comfortable associating with her, then perhaps he should be comfortable being around her as well.

He could hardly fathom why she was that monster’s daughter in the first place. And it didn’t help that another was on the way.

“I can see why,” Bellamy said.

“No shit, Sherlock,” she said as if in a retort, though there was a trace of lighthearted amusement.

For a week, this was the routine: be woken up early by the sound of the work siren, work on some project in the woods around the camp, eat in between, with some additional chores if any. Which resulted in Bellamy crashing into his cot most nights.

Yet, work was a distraction from his grief over Octavia; which receded faster then he had expected. Even if it devasted him, even if he had to relive the horrifying image of McCreary executing her, he had the acknowledge that it was an outcome that would have happened anyway.

Perhaps he should be surprised that it didn’t happen sooner. Though he had seen how Wonkru feared her. Six years before, Bellamy feared that Octavia would provoke the wrong person and that she die or others would get killed as a result. Thing is, her actions resulted in most of Wonkru to die, and it didn’t help that she had a twelve-year-old boy at the front with her when the massacre unfolded.

Though, Bellamy knew that he couldn’t be hungover Octavia’s death for long. As he had his friends here to protect. Murphy was out installing the land mines around the valley’s radius while the rest were here. Miller was still recovering from the injuries that he got when McCreary beat him up.

And he was still talking about rebellion. Though Bellamy could feel the motivation was little to none around here (with Monty and Harper being notable exceptions most likely. The former had managed to be put with Dani’s detail, which might give him the incentive). It was tempting, but Bellamy didn’t have the energy. Perhaps that was that the intention. Wear them out at the end of the day so they wouldn’t even think of it.

Long enough until the notion of rebellion slipped from their heads.

Bellamy saw his friends during mealtimes, and they had short conversations before bed. Though the fact that he rarely saw one particular friend bothered him. Clarke had been busy these days. Either she was with a group of convicts down at the pond or something or doing some other important task. Giving marching orders to some of the enforcers, who have makeshift whips now tied to their belts alongside guns.

Two days ago, Clarke thought to visit them in the church where they were still sleeping in for the time being. “I can’t stay here long,” she said as she sat at the edge of the cot. “I have to check on the progress at the perimeter in fifteen minutes.”

Bellamy wished that he had more than fifteen minutes with her. That their friends had more than fifteen minutes with her. Though they were able to tell her some things within that timespan.

“Miller worries me,” Bellamy said to her, gesturing to Miller. “He’s still going on rebellion, even after McCreary doing a number on him took away that option from people. Even after Diyoza told him that not being a strategist would not guarantee that he would be easy to overthrow.”

Yes, but Hitler was surrounded by strategists, Miller argued. However, McCreary utilized strategists to obtain his victory. And he was keeping one of them close with him.

Perhaps that’s why McCreary made sure that Clarke was away from her friends for most of the time. As he seemed to pick up that Clarke was the strategist of the group. Making sure that she uses her skills for his benefit.

Seeing her walking through the worksite now was enough for his heart to pick up the pace. He needed to find an excuse to talk to her. Perhaps maybe –

The sound of a beam breaking from the next incomplete structure pulled Bellamy from his thoughts. Followed by a groan of agony.

“What happened?” Clarke demanded as he found himself running to the scene. In fact, half of the people in the area stopped what they were doing and rushed towards the scene. Bellamy guessed that the others were too afraid.

“Get to work!” one of the enforcers shouted as Bellamy moved his way through the crowd. “Nothing to see here!”

The person that fell had to be a boy in his mid-teens. His face is red with pain as Niylah was by his side. Though Clarke bent over as well. “Where does it hurt?” Clarke asked him.

“My leg,” he simpered. “It hurts.”

Clarke moved to shift his legs to see which one. Niylah watching her as if she didn’t trust her with her next move. “Haven’t you done enough?” she demanded in condemnation.

Bellamy glared at Niylah, though glancing at Clarke, unfortunately, it was like she was failing in trying to appear as if those words didn’t affect her.

The boy winced and groaned when she touched his right leg.

“Take him to my mom!” Clarke shouted. “Everyone, work, please!”

“You don’t make the orders around here!” sneered Gellert, one of the enforcers. “He needs to keep working.”

(He remembered reading her rap sheet on the ship’s manifest. Double homicide against her boyfriend and another woman).

Bellamy watched with bated breath as Clarke turned towards the Eligius inmate. Walking a few steps towards her. Not backing down.

“He’ll only be able to work once he gets treatment,” Clarke seethed. “As for making orders, yes, I don’t make them, but you are required to listen to me when –”

Gellert pulled out her gun, and Clarke pulled out hers before Bellamy could react. “I got the mic open in my radio,” Clarke warned. “Everything we do and say, McCreary is listening. Right now, he’s at the northern perimeter of the valley, and I highly doubt that you want to deal with him.”

“She’s right,” Dani pitched in, raising her gun. “Mind as well step down now before dad gets here. Deal with me or deal with him. Your choice.”

It didn’t take long for Bellamy to cipher what that meant: either you can squabble with me or choose a more sadistic option when it comes your way. And it seemed that this wasn’t the first time that Dani threatened to set her dad on people.

McCreary could care less if someone was injured working, but he probably wouldn’t want an injured person to slow the group down.

The seconds were stiff as the three of them stood with their guns raised at each other before Gellert lowered her gun. Still scowling at them. “This better be the last time you use your dad as a card to get out of problems,” she threatened before walking away.

Even if the threat worried Bellamy, Dani simply rolled her eyes. Muttering something under her breath. Clarke’s scowl was laced with worry, though. Knowing Clarke, she probably was worried that not being able to keep all of McCreary’s men in line threatened those that she loved.

It was evident that some wanted to listen to McCreary and McCreary alone.

“Return to work, please!” Clarke commanded, yet it sounded more like a plea. As if she was worried that it would be on her as if these people didn’t get to work. One indication that being his right hand wasn’t something that she was thrilled about.

He had to talk to her. Perhaps under the guise of directing something to her attention this afternoon.

* * *

Madi brushed away the potato shavings into a bag after she was done with peeling the potatoes for dinner. She and Clarke would often do things like this before mealtimes, so it wasn’t like she hadn’t done it before.

But she hated having to help prepare vegetables for a bunch of evil people. And this place no longer felt like home after they came. After last week.

Madi grumbled under her breath as she closed the sack shut with her hand before heading on her way. After this, she was going to have to empty out the latrines.

Not wanting to pay no mind to the monster that took control of their home coming this way. Yet, she didn’t think to hop over the leg that was sticking out to trip her.

Jeers and laughter from the criminals filled her ears as she landed on her stomach. The bag spilling open with the potato shavings in front of her. “Clean up, twirp,” leered one of them as her hands shook with anger.

Madi scowled at them as she got to her knees. Maybe she can find the one that tripped her and stab him in the knee. That would show them.

“Don’t you all have something to do?” she heard him demand. “If you don’t clear out in five minutes, you lose half a portion for dinner.”

The group of prisoners walked from where they were standing, and Madi tried hard to ignore him as he approached her. “Need help with that, kiddo?” she was asked.

She shook her head, no. Madi didn’t need help from some bad guy who seemed willing to kill her when he first got here. “I can do it myself,” she argued.

Madi stepped forward to walk past him, but he stopped her. Grabbing her shoulder and holding her back. “Just because I tried killing you when I first got here, there’s no reason for the sass,” he said. Madi was only young when her parents died, but she vaguely remembered his tone. The subtle amusement when a parent thought their child was clinging to the past. “We just got off to a bad start, that is all.”

“I know that you threatened to kill Clarke and me if her mom didn’t cure your people,” Madi pointed out. “Stop acting like you’re normal when you’re not. I may be a child, but I’m not stupid.”

He shook his head and smirked before bending down eye level. “You are smart, which I don’t doubt,” he said. Then he put his mouth to her ear. “Smart enough to know what’s good for that mom of yours and you. If I were you, I would be careful what you say and do, as it may come back to her and it’s what I know you wouldn’t want.”

Madi shivered, tasting the threat in his words. This was an adult who pursued her their first night in the woods, who would have killed her on Diyoza’s orders if Clarke didn’t tell her about the traps she was leading them to. Even if his willingness to kill hadn’t changed, he seemed more dangerous as he was healthy, unlike before.

“I want you to be a good girl, and then we can all be happy if you behave yourself,” he continued. “Would you do that?”

Madi wanted to scowl at him and give him a choice of words. That she was not afraid of him, that she is never scared of him. But she was not stupid. This man was serious in what he said by his words and his tone.

“Yes, sir,” she answered, wanting to protect Clarke. Wanting to make sure that he didn’t kill their friends.”

He smiles. “That’s a good girl,” he says, patting her head with his hand. Madi flinches away. She wished that he didn’t do that. She wasn’t his kid. “Make your mom figure of yours proud, hm.”

Madi looked after him as he walked away. She wasn’t going to allow him to hurt Clarke and anyone else. Even if it meant keeping her head down for a while, then she’ll come up with something.

“Are you ok?” Raven asks her. Madi turned up to look at her, to see Raven looking at her with concern.

“Yes,” she answers.

* * *

“Gellert has a big chip on her shoulder,” Dani brought up an hour before dinner. “She’s as fanatical as they come.”

When Clarke made the decision to become McCreary’s right hand, she expected some resistance. The majority cooperated, though Clarke thought it was to avoid McCreary from flaying them for disobeying him. The minority were fanatically loyal to the point where they wanted to answer to him and him alone.

“So, it seems,” Clarke digressed as she saw Dani trying to mount what looked like the first piece of a satellite. “Trying to keep busy?”

“Reyes keeps driving me nuts with her superiority complex, so I decided to work on a satellite,” she revealed.

“You had Monty restore the Eye,” Clarke pointed out. Three days after the conflict for the valley, McCreary sought out whoever was responsible for the Eye going down, and Clarke felt obligated to fetch Monty. As to avoid McCreary sending one of his close lackeys. And Dani was standing over Monty’s shoulder, shooting daggers at anyone that dared to come close. As if she was afraid intimidation would hinder the process.

Dani shrugged. “We might not be the only group of humans to probably return to this planet,” she answered. “They were talking about colonizing planets before the Earth got nuked out. My mom was invited to go on some out of planet space mission spearheaded by my Uncle Russell for the very same company that drafted inmates to mine toxic fuel, and she turned it down. I wonder if my and my dad’s arrest changed it. Anyways, I shouldn’t be surprised if Eligius III decided to return back to check up on this place to see what became of it.”

Clarke nodded. Monty said something about Eligius having two missions after Eligius II failed. That Eligius III was top secret while Eligius IV’s motives were out in the open.

Being close to dinner time, she was supposed to go the southern perimeter to see if the minefield on that end was completed. If not, she was supposed to send additional enforcers to make sure that they were quick about it.

Something that she wasn’t looking forward to.

Clarke distanced herself from Dani and returned to the main camp. “Heading over to the southern perimeter,” she announced on her radio, as it would be best for them to expect her. And it was at that time that she locked eyes with Bellamy, who was setting down a block of logs.

She saw him a few hours later when that boy fell from the incomplete food store a few miles away, and it’s been a few days since she talked to him. Clarke needed an excuse to talk to him, and perhaps she had one.

Murphy was in the southern perimeter, and people would assume that she was using Bellamy to elicit cooperation. Even if she thought she was better off talking to Murphy with Bellamy there.

“Hey!” she exclaimed, looking at Bellamy. “I need you!”

She watched as Bellamy hesitated. As if he wasn’t sure before he approached her. “Okay, that seems risky,” he mutters.

“Murphy is at the southern perimeter,” she divulged. “I need his cooperation.”

The southern perimeter was a few miles away from one the sites where the dwellings were being built. Meaning that Clarke had to wait until they were past a set of trees until they could talk.

“You did good back there,” he told her. “Did what you could to avoid his attention.”

In fact, that was the reason why she threatened Gellert that McCreary could come where they were standing. As it seemed that she didn’t want to be made an example of for disobeying a right hand. But she didn’t lower her weapon until Dani threatened her.

“Dani was why she lowered her weapon,” Clarke pointed out. “And she didn’t seem happy about it.”

“Still, you stood your ground,” Bellamy pointed out. “Besides, most of them don’t seem to give you problems.”

“Probably because they don’t want to give _him_ any problems,” she pointed out. “I give out his marching orders, make sure that things are done accordingly for him, and to provide him strategic advice. I’m not surprised if they are waiting for me to make one mistake so he could kill me. Though that might make Murphy’s and Raven’s day if McCreary kills me.”

“They will come around, Clarke,” he tries to assure. “They are angry. I understand why but they’ll see that all you were doing was trying to protect your mom, Madi. We would do anything to protect the ones we care about. Sounds crazy, but with you being McCreary’s right hand, you are just making sure that we survive.”

Clarke swallowed. It meant something to hear Bellamy say that. That it showed that no matter what happened, he was still by her side. His unrelenting faith in her, even if they were now under control of a sociopath.

“I just wish that you didn’t have to wear that shock collar around your neck,” she pointed out.

“I’m sure you can convince him to take it off,” he promised. “Once he could trust you, of course.”

When exactly? McCreary was as bull-headed as they come. From her observation, once he made up his mind, there was no changing his mind. Especially when it came to his desire to bring pain and discomfort to people. Even if she convinced him to not kill Echo, it was only because it would provide him a few more people to control. He said that the collars were only temporary, but he would have preferred them to be permanent.

There was no way that he would have the collar removed from Bellamy’s neck, no matter what she would do to convince him.

The southern perimeter was evident by the pathway to the gorge. And she could spot Murphy concealing something with dirt, his companions almost done with their project. Clarke could hardly notice them, though maybe it was the intention to have them resemble small rocks in the ground.

Which made the situation more dangerous.

“Almost finished?” Clarke called out.

“Yeah, we got his mines finished,” she heard Murphy retort. “Might as well have Emori test one out, huh? Like, you could have cared less if she was going to get fried in that tube six years ago.”

Clarke opened her mouth –

“Knock it off, Murphy,” Bellamy shot back. “That’s the last thing that she wants.”

She swallowed as a couple Eligius inmates gazed at them. Braxton lifting her eyebrow in amusement. “Clarke brings her boyfriend to help keep this one contained,” she muses. “Then again, he drives us nuts anyway.”

“Well, sorry if his antics give you grief,” Clarke retorted.

“Alright, the mines are covered,” said one of the members of Murphy’s group. “Now, let's get out of here before we accidentally set one off. Or Graveyard is going to have us scalped and flayed if we do.”

Clarke lifted her radio. Set on informing McCreary that the mines were completed, even if she didn’t want to.

“Griffin, there is something that needs your attention,” said someone on the other end of her radio. Morrison, maybe? It sounded like it.

And there was something about those words that unsettled her. That something has happened. With shaking hands, she picked up her radio. “Yes?” she asked.

“The doc wants you to come quick,” was the answer. “It’s your daughter.”

A horror like none other seeded in Clarke’s stomach as she processed the information. Her legs nothing like gelatin.

_Madi!_ She mouthed, her feet taking her from where she was standing.

* * *

“Where’s Dani?” was the question that came out of Shaw’s mouth as he entered the van; which was the workshop for what Raven assumed to be for this bunch’s designated techies.

Raven shrugged, not keeping her eyes off of Madi. Who was scaling some unfinished structure a few miles away. Carrying a water bucket. “She said that she had to work on satellite,” she grumbled before snorting. “Apparently, I was aggravating her.”

How Raven saw it, Dani was nothing but a pretentious know-it-all. As if hacking computers in the office of a Bronx District Attorney back in the day made her special. Not to mention that she was the adult child of that sadist. She could not understand what Wells saw in that bitch anyway.

“That’s what happens when two people that are too much alike are in the same room,” Shaw said with a chuckle. Before eyeing his leg that was still bandaged. Raven shuddered, thinking back to when McCreary forced her to watch him crush his leg until she broke. He narrowly avoided having his leg amputated.

All of which wouldn’t have happened if Clarke hadn’t sold them out to McCreary. They wouldn’t have been in this situation if it weren’t for her.

“I hate her,” Raven said before she could stop herself.

“Raven, we all had a part in this,” Shaw countered, exasperated. “All of us played a role in McCreary getting the valley, killing most of Wonkru. We’re not innocent in this either.”

Shaw was talking about the riot that they instigated. Even if they had a part, it was only so they could run without being seen. Clarke on the other hand –

“Clarke told them about the Eye being down,” she pointed out. “She told McCreary that Wonkru was on the move; she sold us out in the church, allowing you to be tortured and having me but to no choice launch those missiles, so yes, it makes all the difference in the world.”

Shaw appeared as if he was going to say something. As if he was going to say otherwise. No matter what he was going to say, Clarke had a more prominent role. All they were doing was just surviving.

That was when there was a commotion that could be heard from outside.

“She fell!” she heard someone shout. “Get the doctor!”

Remembering that she saw Madi scaling the soon to be workshop, Raven ran as fast as her lame leg could allow her. Wincing as she ran from the steps, watching a crowd surround somebody. Abby running towards them.

“Out of the way,” she shouted as Raven observed that half of the inmates were still doing their work. Like they could care less for what was happening.

Imagine her horror when she saw Madi lying beside the bucket she was carrying. Legs bent, and arms splayed around her.

Oh my god, she mouthed as Abby examined her.

“Her pulse is weak,” she said. “I need to get her to the gas station quickly. Jackson, Niylah, get me a stretcher.”

Within moments, a group of people ran from the trees. Clarke running at the front; Bellamy at her heel. “Madi!” she shouted. “Madi!”

As awful as Raven felt, seeing Clarke kneeling by her; tears streaming on her face as she begged for Madi to wake up, this wouldn’t have happened if Clarke gave McCreary what he needed to destroy Wonkru.

* * *

“Have any of you talked to her?” Bellamy asked to no one in particular; stabbing the earth with a shovel. To make that well for this area.

“No,” Wells answers, shaking his head. “I mean, I see her in the distance once in a while, but it seems that she’s hesitant to even speak with me. Almost like she’s afraid something will happen if she does.”

“I remember overhearing that he now has her, and her mom eat with him,” Roan pitched in before scoffing. “This whole incident reeks. As it’s suspicious that she happened to fall as Clarke went into the woods with you five days ago.”

It’s been almost a week since Madi fell from the new workshop and since then she’s been a coma. “But she’s in stable condition,” Abby told him hours later after the incident. “No severe brain damage as far as I know and when she wakes up, the odds of her walking again are…”

Bellamy remembered the guilt all too well when he heard that there wasn’t a chance that Madi would walk again. Had he stayed, this wouldn’t have happened. Though maybe Clarke was blaming herself as well.

Bellamy wanted to squeeze some hours of the day to be with Clarke when she visited Madi. To give her his support, let her know that it wasn’t all her fault. That this was on him as well. To place a hand on her shoulder, to allow her to cry on his shoulder.

But he wasn’t able with the change of his meal schedule, that he had to do an additional task here and there. In the times he did see Madi was either by himself or with one of his friends during the second half of their mealtimes if they coincided.

“Things happen, Bellamy,” Echo said at one point. “Don’t beat yourself over something that you couldn’t control.”

Echo tried to help. Be supportive, but it wasn’t working. Didn’t help him to relieve his guilt.

Aside from that, he had some suspicions about the timing of Madi’s accident, if it wasn’t an accident at all. And Roan’s statement confirmed it in some ways. As if McCreary was trying to find more ways to divide them.

They say that division was a tyrant’s favorite weapon to remain in power.

Bellamy could find McCreary. Try to persuade him just so he could speak with Clarke. Say that there is something that needed her attention, but Bellamy was no idiot. Either he would mock him or try to manipulate him. Thing is, he wasn’t going to see him first.

“I’m going to see if Diyoza needs any help,” he said before tossing aside the shovel.

“Are you sure?” Miller asked, “because last I knew, leaving your task was punishable by a round of one of these.” He gestures to the shock collar.

Miller had since stopped speaking about talks of reckless revolution. “I was stupid,” he admitted three days ago. “Emotion got the best of me and…there has got to be something that doesn’t involve us getting killed.”

Though Bellamy knew Miller had begun to realize that he was following a tyrannical reign. That what he did was on behalf on his sister, who had enforced fighting pits and killed people for not eating the flesh of their dead. That it was not something to be avenged after all.

“I doubt he’s going to care if it’s to help a pregnant woman,” said Bellamy in the present, though he knew that the only reason that McCreary wasn’t going to put Diyoza in stressful situations was for the baby. Not because he cared about her.

He watched as Roan picked up the shovel as he walked towards the main encampment. There was a risk to this, as she had someone with her all the time. The same young woman always seemed to accompany her. Probably hired to make sure that she didn’t cause problems.

Bellamy spotted Diyoza at some makeshift table. Grouped with other prisoners as they sorted vegetables. He second-guessed his decision at first. No doubt someone was going to hear what they were going to talk about.

He was about to make the decision to turn and go when Diyoza locked eyes with him. Bellamy watched as she turned to speak with someone before rising from her seat. Seeing that she was without her companion, maybe she was heading to where the latrines were located.

So he decided to do her a favor and make it his destination as well.

“I’m afraid that I can’t be too much help,” Diyoza shared.

“I just want to know, how good is he at causing division?” he asked. “You worked with him back when you were forced to mine.”

She looked around before turning to him. “Very good, I’m afraid,” she answered. “If a small group formed within that faction of his, he orchestrates something to cause it. Manipulate the situation or someone to divide them.”

Manipulating the situation or orchestrating things to sow division. “Do you think it was an accident to what happened to Madi?”

Diyoza shook her head. “From what I know about him, he would know that whenever a child is in critical condition, the mother would stay by their side in every opportunity they find. I wouldn’t put it past him to stage it just so he could separate her from her friends.”

It was apparent why McCreary would do this. Separate Clarke from him and the rest of them. It’s like he figured out that Clarke was the strategist of the group. That whatever they did, they succeeded because of her. Though it was like having her with him wasn’t enough, he had to cut her off from most of her support group. Making her vulnerable from influences.

“He’s dividing her from us because he fears it would undermine his power,” Bellamy told her. “And he keeps her with him to stay in power, only he seems to be finding more ways.”

“To be honest, I would have divided you from each other had I still had power over all of them, if your sister died at your hand as promised,” Diyoza admitted. “To separate your group from each other to avoid problems. You want to weaken a group and take away their power, you separate them from each other.”

“Why am I not surprised,” he retorted. Of course, Diyoza would have made sure that he, Clarke, and their friends were separated from each other to destabilize them.

“Only he seems more interested in just removing her from the equation then to separate the entire lot of you,” she says. “I kind of understand it: without her, you guys are basically useless, and if you do plan something, it will fail. Seems like he wants to separate you two especially.”

As for her last words, Bellamy could feel his blood boiling throughout his veins. It didn’t help that he suspected that McCreary would separate them. Make them vulnerable that way.

“Can you give me one tip?” he asked Diyoza.

She looks around as if she heard him. “Want to start a revolution?” she advised. “You start quietly, then make noise. In this case, it’s best to be quiet, though I’m not sure if it would succeed without Clarke.”

They had to take McCreary down. That couldn’t be denied. They could plan without her, but would they succeed? They could try, but it would be a test.

* * *

Tears glistened in Clarke’s eyes as she sat by the table where Madi lay. Stroking her brown hair as she had gazed at the heart monitor. Kissing her forehead; mouthing “I’m sorry.”

For almost a week and when she wasn’t tasked to do something, Clarke got every chance she did to be with Madi. Whether it was mealtimes (though since the incident, McCreary wanted her and her mom to eat with him, much to Clarke’s anxiety) or some other space of time where she could talk to her, read to her. It helped the brain she read.

Her mom said that Madi will wake up but will be unable to walk on her own when she does. Hopefully, someone would be thoughtful enough to put together a wheelchair. Or a brace like Raven’s.

Even if it couldn’t have been avoided, Clarke could still feel the guilt sweeping through her. Had she left Bellamy alone, he would have made sure that she was alright. That she would have had someone there to help her with that bucket of water.

Oh, Bellamy. She had her mom; Kane, but with Bellamy, they could at least share the guilt. Now, it was increasingly difficult to even see him and any of her other friends. She could try, but that sort of selfishness could get them killed.

She heard the door creak open. “Raven, I don’t want to hear anymore,” she said. Raven had come hours earlier to see Madi, though that didn’t stop her from throwing choice words.

“You can say that what you did was for Madi’s sake all you like, Clarke,” she seethed. “She wouldn’t be in a coma and paralyzed if you hadn’t sold us out; if you hadn’t sold Wonkru out. What you did was selfish, and you know it.”

The logical part of her brain argued not to listen that this would have happened in other circumstances. Though the nasty voice in the back of her head argued that this was as a result of selfishness. And those two conflicting thoughts were at war with each other.

“You know, you could use eyes in the back of your head,” she heard him say.

He was the last person that she needed here. Technically, the only reason why he could be here is to reprimand her for not having her radio on. That he needed her for something.

“I mean, I know I’m probably spending too much time here,” Clarke quickly got out as she looked at him, “when I should be doing other things.”

“No, you’re fine,” he said as he stepped forward. “I get that she’s not related to you by blood, but it’s what all parents do when their kids are in situations like this.”

McCreary predictably didn’t say much about Madi’s accident. He did say, “Hopefully, she can wake up soon so your mind wouldn’t get tangled up.” She wasn’t expecting concern or anything. Madi wasn’t his, so he could care less whether she could walk or not.

Clarke tried to hide her discomfort as he stood beside her. Whatever it was, it could wait.

“Oh, the feeling of standing by a hospital bed,” he mused beside her after a minute of silence. “Seeing wires and similar shit connected to your kid. I know that feeling very well.”

Clarke could easily brush it off as one of his ways to slime into her life. Trick her into her most vulnerable. Though it seemed it opened another doorway for her to get access into his life. Even if she fought not to open it, temptation said otherwise.

“Kid was in the hospital?” she asked.

“My youngest,” he answered. “Bianca, we named her. She got bone cancer at seven. I remember spending a good part of my year in the children’s hospital during that year. It didn’t stop me from going on my hits for the mob, but I made sure that I was there. She went into remission at eight, and all was well until she was fourteen. As they say, when cancer comes back, it’s a bigger bitch then it was before.”

Clarke remembered reading somewhere how sociopaths weaponize empathy to trap their victims. And it seems that McCreary fit the bill. Though Clarke hated that he did this, as this was probably to make her vulnerable to him, he wasn’t counting that him sharing sensitive pieces of his past could set him up for attack.

That she would weaponize it later.

“Cancer and being in a coma are two different things,” she pointed out, as she knew it wasn’t sympathy that he was looking for. He wasn’t the type.

“I know, but sometimes shit happens to loved ones,” he replied. “Things that out of our control.”

She tasted the salt in her mouth as she swallowed back the tears; as she fought to hold them back. He did it. He tapped into that part of her life that she wished that he didn’t tap into. If he was trying to make her vulnerable by merely sharing some parts of his life, he was nearly succeeding, but Clarke wasn’t going to let McCreary win.

She wasn’t going to share her guilt over her father’s death; over Lexa’s death. Deaths that were out of her control but fed that guilt within her regardless.

“Have something to share?” he offered. “As I said, I’m not all that unapproachable.”

“No,” she lied, swallowing back her tears. Clarke balled her fists as she walked past him.

Clarke wasn’t going to play into his game. She was going to fight, though it seemed like there was a part of her might cave against her will.

After dinner, she had only spent a couple hours helping Kane update his maps when she felt that anxiety buried within her flare-up. No, no. Clarke knew herself enough of what would happen if it does.

“I think you should get some rest, Clarke,” Kane advised. “You haven’t slept much for the past five days.”

“I rest until we get this done,” she stressed. “Otherwise I wouldn’t hear the end of it about how I didn’t make sure that you updated these maps.”

She attempted to bury the stress as they worked over the maps for another two hours. Only for it to rise up around the time Kane left her side. “Just get some sleep, please,” he said. “Your mother and I will check on Madi for you.”

“Thanks,” she croaked. “I appreciate it.”

It appeared that he was going to say something else, but refrained from doing so. As if he was afraid that it would come out wrong. It was when Kane left when Clarke beat her fists against the metal walls of the empty bridge. Not stopping until black blood coated her knuckles.

She bandaged them, though it seemed that the abuse on her knuckles didn’t abate all of the tension.

As if there was too much pent up and she was half full of it.

Bellamy and Echo were involved with each other. Niylah wasn’t an option for obvious reasons, and it would be dangerous to choose one of her friends. As they would become a target. And that left one horrifying variable.

No, no, no.

That would be giving him what he wants. In fact, he was probably waiting for this moment. That she comes to him at night, therefore making her more vulnerable. Just today, he almost succeeded in having her open up about her dad; about Lexa.

As much as Clarke tried to fight that decision, she found herself walking the corridor towards where she would sleep with Madi, and he would sleep. He was still sleeping in the Head Overseer’s Berth last time she knew, as the cabins weren’t completed yet.

When she arrived at his door, Clarke gulped and hesitated before knocking. Waiting for him to answer. After all, she was no stranger to masochistic decisions, and this was one of them.

_You can always turn back_ , that voice in her mind said.

The door opens, and Clarke stands face to face with him. Whatever doubts she had about this decision, they were slipping away. Even if Clarke wanted to cling to them.

“Now, this is a surprise,” he purrs, though Clarke knew that probably only one thought came to his head as she was visiting him this late at night. “Come on in, Clarke.”

As she stepped in, it was as if all fight against his influence was fading.

* * *

_“What you did was selfish and unforgivable. I hate you.”_

_“It was to get my friends out of here. Where you, on the other hand, put them in a situation where they would get killed.”_

_“Friends that she allowed to be tortured.”_

_“I’d rather you die trying to save Miller from getting jumped then standing there just to save your ass.”_

_“You can say that what you did was for Madi’s sake all you like, Clarke. She wouldn’t be in a coma and disabled if you hadn’t sold us out if you hadn’t sold Wonkru out. What you did was selfish, and you know it.”_

Clarke swallowed as those words and others repeated in her head. Tears burning as she touched the bruised areas of her neck. Wincing as she felt the tender skin. Trying not to think where they came from, even if the source was beside her in his bed.

“ _Maybe there are no good guys_ ,” were her mother’s words six years ago.

What if her mom was wrong? What if she didn’t do these things for her friends, but for herself? Maybe this was for herself rather than ensure the safety of Madi, her mom. Maybe Madi wouldn’t be in a coma if it weren’t for her. Maybe Bellamy would still have his sister if it weren’t for her. Maybe she didn’t care if her friends were tortured.

_“Then we are no different after all. Two birds of a feather, is what we are.”_

Perhaps she was no different from Paxton McCreary. That maybe they both kill and inflict pain without caring how it hurt others.

Clarke blinked away the tears. Wiping the snot from her nose.

_If I am the bad guy that they paint me to be, perhaps I should start acting like one_ , she thought with a heavy defeat. _Maybe I should stop being the good guy._

With those thoughts, Clarke had felt herself starting to sink into the abyss. As if she hadn’t felt that earlier. Therefore, opening the door to the monster of the valley.


	4. Chapter Four

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As this was thought of before Season 6, I never thought of merging Eligius III and Eligius IV together.
> 
> That being said, here come the Primes (though some are OCs and don't belong in Canon)

“Wow, this is unexpected,” mused one Josephine Lightbourne as she gazed out the window of the Eligius III. Twirling a strand of her dark brown hair. “Wonder what led to this?”

It was said that originally, the ancestors of the members of Team Alpha were to return to Earth after two hundred years to do a report on what became of it. Something that did not escape them even after the centuries of taking on Host after Host. Besides, her parents had no reason to be wary of her desire to spearhead the mission to check on Earth’s status. It was only fitting that some of the original team were an part of it. Besides, Aunt Sarah was here with them, so they shouldn’t need to worry.

Regarding what was in front of them, Earth did have some environmental mishaps when she and the rest of Team Alpha left for what they now know as Sanctum. Like those dust storms in December, but what they were seeing before them had to be of an greater scale then environmental.

On an positive note, as least there will be no Red Sun Eclipse psychosis. No time bending Anomaly here.

“Maybe our neighbors know a thing or two,” suggested Gabriel Santiago. Gesturing towards the windows. To their east, a giant galleon was orbiting Earth in a distance. Eligius IV according to their monitors.

“You’d think an bunch of criminals would tell us what happened?” Josephine pointed out. She turned to her Aunt Sarah. “You said Eligius IV was prison labor. That they were mining tons of Hythylodium. Fun stuff.”

She nodded before looking from the window of the bridge. “Perhaps she lost her way, and they happened to have just arrived. I am willing to bet that both of the crew and the miners are setting up camp.”

“If my sister and my dad went on that ship, and if they see us, they wouldn’t be able to recognize some of us,” Avery pointed out.

Josie nodded in understanding, as that was the only downer about this whole thing with the Blood and the Hosts. There was no way the Hosts would be exactly like how they were when in their Primes. Besides –

“Why worry when we won’t tell them in the place?” she pointed out. “They’ll just think we abandoned the practice of last names. Well let’s buckle in and take off,” Josephine dictates. “We’ll land outside of the patch of green until we get some communication.”

However, checking on Earth’s status was not Josephine’s only interest. No, correction: seeing what became of her former home did not interest her in the slightest.

* * *

“What did Diyoza have to say?” Echo asked as she and Bellamy lay tightly together; their cots touching. There was a clap of thunder from outside, accompanied by a flash of lightning. “Something must be important if I saw you follow her to the latrines?”

Bellamy should have known that Echo would have seen it without him knowing. His lover was a spy for Ice Nation back in the day. Though this was some information that he knew she would want to hear.

“I was asking her about McCreary,” he answered. He snorts. “I’m not surprised that a sadist would be divisive. Not to mention, manipulate events to his benefit.”

“Hmm, I figured something was fishy about the circumstances of Madi’s fall,” Echo concurred. “What are the odds that it happened when Clarke took you to the southern perimeter? He was seizing an opportunity to separate you from your best friend.”

Even if Echo resented Clarke for what happened, she knew how important they were to each other. How others saw how important they were to each other. How important Clarke was to everyone on her life.

“We got to do something,” he whispered. “Even if it’s not immediate…” he sighed. Thinking over his options, there was one that could be done. Even if it unsettled him. Even if it put Echo in danger, but he had to remind himself. Echo was a warrior. She’s probably done more risky ventures then the one he was going to propose. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to, but I want you to try to get into McCreary’s inner circle.”

Echo narrowed her eyes. “This isn’t the same as going into enemy territory and scoping out a threat,” she countered. “They know who I am.”

“Yes, but it’s our only option we have at the moment without raising attention,” he pointed out. Their only option until Bellamy can find a way to communicate with Clarke the next time. McCreary was going to make it difficult, but Bellamy would try to find a way. Right now, he had to rely on Echo’s stealth, though he would rather have Clarke’s strategic thinking in the mix.

Echo furrowed her eyebrows as if in deep thought before nodding. “Alright, Bellamy,” she promised. “At least I’ll try.”

Even if Echo never guaranteed her success, at least it was worth a try to do something then nothing. They had to do something.

Nearly two weeks and Bellamy was already tired of doing nothing.

“Then, we might as well break things off,” Echo continues, her voice breaking. “They know that I’m your girlfriend, and if I get caught, McCreary will use you as leverage against me. Something that I don’t want him to give.”

Bellamy swallowed, understanding what Echo meant. For her to do this, they have to break up for the time being until she was done with her task. It just won’t be safe for her to do this if they were still a couple.

Though a lot can happen between now and then.

* * *

Clarke shifted her sore limbs as she laid in the bed. Desperately trying to ignore that he was pinching the soft flesh of her body. Harder each time, as if he was trying to see how much pain was required for her to react. Unfortunately for him, pain has been a part of her life since she landed on the ground.

Besides, of course, McCreary would see how much pain she could tolerate after sex. He was addicted to it just as her mom was addicted to pain medication: he can’t get enough.

It was when he pinched the flesh on her hip when she reacted. Turning to glare at him, only out of annoyance of his continuing habit to test her pain index.

“I highly doubt that you didn’t feel any pain with all that,” he said. He takes her wrists and pins them above her head.

“Pain is an old friend of mine, McCreary,” she confessed, taking the risk to piss him off. At this point, she didn’t seem to care. Might as well not feel any pain from him if they are no different from each other.

“Hmm, too bad,” he said, hovering over her. Tightening his grip on her wrists, as if he wanted to break them but didn’t. “Everyone gets their dose of pain, you should be no exception.”

Clarke turned her wrists in his grip when there is a series of taps on the door. McCreary mutters a string of profanities under his breath. “Give us a minute!” he spits out as if whatever this was, he wasn’t finished with what he was doing.

He freed her; allowing Clarke to reach for her clothes that were on the floor. Picking up her black tank top, she saw that he ripped one of the straps from the front end when he pulled it off from her body. She flattened the fabric under the jacket. She was going to have to replace that shirt with one of the clothes that were brought down from the mothership a few days ago.

While Clarke was dressed entirely, he had only put on his briefs and coveralls; not putting his arms in the top part before he went to the door. As if putting on his undershirt was a waste of time.

“What is it?” he demanded.

“Dani’s satellite picked up a presence in Earth’s orbit a few hours ago,” she heard Gellert answer. “Also, the Eye is showing some activity a few miles away from the Gorge’s location.”

At first, Clarke thought it was the Ring until she came to the conclusion that she would have picked it up after she mounted it. Then she remembered Dani’s words about Eligius IV probably not being the last to return to Earth.

McCreary turned to her. “Well, let’s go check this out.” He puts on his undershirt and zips up his coveralls before they both walk out of the room. Clarke could sense the suggestive stares from the others as they walked down the hallway.

She wished that they weren’t correct, but why else would she be in his room?

Dani, Braxton, and Simmons were already there when they got to the bridge. The windows indicating that it was in the early morning.

“What is there to report?” McCreary asked.

“The satellite from the ground picked up these radio signals this morning,” Dani answered, turning on the dial that was labeled, _outside satellite_. Clarke was never as technologically fluent as Monty and Raven, though those two pairs of radio waves probably meant something.

“What about contact?” Clarke asked.

Dani turned on her radio. “We pre-recorded this when we heard it the second time,” she answered.

“This is Team Alpha from Eligius III,” they heard. “If anyone from the vicinity of Eligius IV hears this, pick up.”

Eligius III. Monty said that there were three missions prior to Eligius IV. With Eligius III being the most secretive.

“Curious,” he muses, as if something about this development piques his interest. “Did you make an effort to speak to them?”

“No,” said Simmons. “Perhaps they were away from their radios.”

“Aside from that how many of them did you count?” McCreary asked abruptly.

Dani bought up her satellite image. Revealing what seemed to be a copse of trees. There wasn’t too much activity, though she spotted three people in a group talking. Oblivious to the fact that they were being watched miles away. “We counted nine when they landed,” Dani answered. “Perhaps they spread out.”

“Who would have thought? Another group purporting to be Eligius returns to find the planet devastated,” McCreary says beside her. “Why should I be surprised? Any indication of their whereabouts?”

“If our estimation is correct, they landed about a few hours from here walking distance,” Dani answered.

Just a few hours.

“What do you want us to do, boss?” Gellert asked him.

McCreary scoffed. “Nothing,” he answered. “They’ll find out on their own that this place is mined. Maybe it will give them the common sense for the rest of them not to cross after seeing one or two of their own get blown to bits.”

Clarke had a feeling that these newcomers might try to investigate the valley today. That the people here in the valley will find out then that the perimeter is mined.

She swallowed. Placing herself in their shoes for when they find out that the valley perimeter is mined. If she was correct, and they try to play hopscotch around them like she would –

“And if they find a way to avoid them?” she asked. When he turned, she continued. “I am speaking as being one of the first people from space to land on the Earth after two hundred years. Trust me, they would be able to find a way around obstacles.”

“If and when they do, surely they won’t mind joining us,” he said. “Can’t result in our own species to go extinct, can we? Since they are from the same company as us, maybe they’ll be smart enough to speak first before crossing.”

No killing. That was a first. But McCreary was no idiot.

“Sir…?” asked one of them as if he was unsure by this decision.

“Carry on as if this is a normal day until one of the mines blow,” he says. “If anyone plays hopscotch around the mines, use the collars to find them. This place could use a good old-fashioned flogging if people are thinking of pulling anything.”

The moral part of her tried to push through. Be the one to tend the wounds when it happens, it said.

_What’s the point? You are the villain, anyway._

Clarke stuck with the latter.

* * *

Puddles from last night’s storm splashed against Echo’s boots as she made her way for her morning’s work. Gritting her teeth as that music blasted from the speakers.

_If only I could find the source of that noise and destroy it_ , she thought with annoyance. It seemed to be the same type, some stronger than others. If she can find someone that is carrying the source…

“Move it, boy!” someone shouted as Echo heard the crack of one of the whips. Echo turned her gaze to see one of the Wonkru survivors trying to shield himself from the cables. Biting her lip as she refrained herself from doing anything.

Especially since the person that came to the boy’s defense was knocked to the ground due to from the collar around their neck.

“Alright, that’s enough,” she could hear Dani say. “I’m sure he got the point.”

Analyzing Dani, Echo remembered her assignment from Bellamy (Echo swallowed, holding back tears at her decision to break up with him. But it had to be done. For his safety): infiltrate McCreary’s inner circle before they can come up with anything else. Being McCreary’s eldest daughter, odds are high that she is in his inner circle. Befriending her is her best bet.

“Get back to work, or else you get a taste of the whip,” one of McCreary’s enforcers threatened to her as Murphy approached them.

“Hey, I got this,” he maintained. Grabbing Echo’s arm and steering her away. “I never thought that you would be stupid,” he whispered.

Echo could only roll her eyes, not turning her gaze away from Dani. Who was walking towards the eastern quadrant. Raven and Monty were tasked to work with her, so maybe she can approach her under the guise of giving them some water.

Though she remembered hearing Dani talk about how much she craved blueberries.

* * *

“How has she been doing?” Clarke asked her mom as she stepped into the gas station. Her focus on Madi.

“She is showing a little more brain activity than yesterday,” her mom said as Clarke stood by the table. “Hopefully she wakes up soon.”

Clarke swallowed as she nodded. Squeezing Madi’s hand. That brace that Raven was working on should be done by the time that Madi woke up. Clarke wanted to be there when Madi wakes up.

She has to be.

“When did that happen?”

She could feel her mom’s hand on her neck. And she flinched away when she touched the bruises. Clarke gazed at her mom, figuring out what to say. She doubted that her mom would be happy if she learned that she had been screwing McCreary the night before.

_I pissed him off_ , she was going to say. _I meant to come across as funny, but he took it the wrong way_.

But her mom wouldn’t buy that. Not to mention that Clarke didn’t want to lie to her.

Clarke swallowed. “Yeah, he plays rough,” she answered. “Not the gentle type, but I would have known that already.”

The blood drained from her mom’s face. “Clarke, why…do you know how reckless that is?” she scolded. “That he could have killed you?”

Clarke could tell that her mom was going to say something else as well. That she slept with the man, who took the valley via a bloody massacre against the enemy. A man that threatened her life and Madi’s life if her mom wouldn’t cure them. A man who Clarke decided that she was no different from.

“What do you want me to do?” she demanded. “Lie about it? Besides, you can tell me that you don’t like the fact that out of all people, it was him.”

“I do have my reservations, yes,” her mom admitted. “Clarke, you’re opening a doorway for him to take advantage of you emotionally.”

Maybe I already am, she thought. Besides, I’m no different from him anyway, she was going to say, though she didn’t want to see the heartbreak on her mom’s face at that revelation.

No mom wants to find out that their child is some monster.

“Mom, I am fine,” she said before changing the subject. “Now mom, since the residence blocks are nearly finished…”

Clarke laid out the map on the main table, specifically ones where the first part of the residences was planned out. Clarke was tempted to place her and Madi with Kane and her mom, though she initially decided some time ago that she and Madi would have their own cabin. Though the events of last night would change that; that it appears that the two of them would be bunking with McCreary. Though Diyoza was probably only going to be there as well because of the baby.

Only she failed to update it this morning. And maybe it was for the best. Though that meant she wouldn’t update it later.

And Clarke didn’t stay long as she had other obligations. “I’ll keep you updated on Madi’s condition,” her mom promised. “I’ll inform you as soon as she wakes up.”

Clarke nodded as she pressed a kiss on Madi’s forehead. _You’ll wake up, and I’ll make sure that you’re safe_ , she promised mentally. She placed the map under her arm and departed out the door.

_Got to go to the eastern quadrant to see them wrapping up the construction. Make sure everything is up to par_ , she thought. _Go to the hovercraft, retrieve our stuff, and –_

_Booom!_

Everyone stopped around her as she heard that earth-shattering boom of a mine exploding. Those around her looking around with pale faces.

“Mines?” someone demanded. “When did that happen?”

Clarke lifted her radio. “Make sure that everyone stays where they are standing,” she commanded. “Commanding all enforcers to do a count, make sure that no one has left. I’m going to investigate.”

She takes off, not oblivious to the fact that a few Eligius inmates were at her heel. Of course, they would. They got to make sure that the right hand is protected, right? Her feet guided her to the source of the explosion, which led to the gorge last time Clarke knew.

And these people are not far from the gorge.

Clarke stopped when she saw it. Blood, skin, bones, and remains of a human scattering over the border between valley and desolate soil. Blood pounding in her ears, she carefully stepped towards the scene of the explosion.

“Griffin, careful!” shouted one of them.

Clarke avoided the rocks, for they could have been mines in actuality. She scans the area until something golden catches her eye. Clarke exhales before bending down with caution. Picking up the piece of fabric.

On an piece of fabric, was the unmistakable Eligius Corporation logo.

* * *

“Let’s see what we get here,” Jaime Foster said to herself as she carried the tubes of soil. If it’s anything that she learned in Sanctum, the soil can tell the story of the planet. Of what it has been through.

Despite being an top notch botanist (an feat rare for Nulls, as they were often cooks, guards, janitors, and whatever menial thing), she almost did not make the cut with her being an Null and all. Gabriel Prime had to convince Josephine Prime to allow her on the mission alongside Howard Kennedy, who had the Blood.

Well, those two were whipped for each other. The best love story in all of Sanctum.

“Doing okay in here?” asked Avery as he slipped into the tent she was in.

“Just about done with these soil cylinders.” Jaime put the three tubes in the chemical reader before tapping on her computer monitor. “What have you been up to?”

Ever since she was slated to join the final phase of Team Alpha’s colony mission, Avery Prime volunteered to go. Saying that perhaps they could use an sixth member of the original members of the team to accompany the group, which resulted in Sarah Prime to come as well. Though not forbidden, relationships between Nulls and those with the blood were frowned upon, even if the Host was acquainted with said Null before the former became one with one of the Primes.

Avery sighs as he sits down. “The only thing edible is bugs around here,” he says. “Whatever else is edible is probably in that spot of green. Ryker, Rachel, Jasmine, and Howard have headed to the spot of Eden a couple hours ago, despite Josephine and Gabriel’s warning not to. Right now, Josephine is giving Russell an update. She hopes to try again to get in touch with those from Eligius IV.”

“Unless it’s like Sanctum and radios don’t work here too,” she said. as the words loaded on the screen. Got it! However, excitement turned to confusion when Jaime read over the analytics. No, wait. This couldn’t be right. “The soil is irradiated. Not only that, but it shows that the last nuclear event was six years ago. The first one being two centuries before that.”

That couldn’t be right. The first nuclear apocalypse could have wiped out the remaining warheads. Unless…

“You don’t suppose the reactors melted out as well?” Avery asked.

They were supposed to last only two hundred years before they melted down.

“That’s a strong possibility,” she said. As for the soil, they had that botanical cocktail that could rejuvenate damaged soil, patented by Sarah Prime herself. It worked on Sanctum. and there was no doubt that it would work here. As for nuclear accidents. “I was wondering if the people in that spot of Eden know a thing or two how the world ended twice when it’s supposed to be a one-time thing?”

“Um, guys, I don’t think the valley is an option right now.” Ryker storms in, followed by Jasmine and Rachel. The three of them ashen, and it didn’t help that blood and pieces of brain was on their faces. Something that turned Jaime’s stomach upside down.

“What happened?” asked Avery. “Where’s Howard?”

“Thing is…we had arrived at the valley, and Howard took the first step.” Jasmine takes deep breathes. “We warned him not to trip over rocks or what we thought were rocks.”

As she digested the information, only one horrifying conclusion came to her. Land mines.

“Shit,” said Avery.

* * *

“It couldn’t have been one of us, could it?” Bellamy heard Raven say within the crowd in the area that they were herded into one part of the valley. He hoped that it wasn’t.

As that’s how it was intended for them to find out about the land mines. That one of them steps on them. Murphy did say that they were designed to look as if they were rocks embedded in the soil.

Making it easier to fool people.

“Of course, keep mum about explosives,” Roan retorted from behind. “That way they won’t call his bluff.”

It would be another way to keep them in. To tell them, “You don’t want to go that way, do you?” A sadistic decision for a sadist.

It wasn’t long before Clarke came into view. With a trio of Eligius Miners around her. Fists balled, Clarke bounded towards the hovercraft. Not bothering to look at him in the eye even if she was a few feet away.

Making Bellamy close enough to see bruises around her neck. The sight of which made his blood boil. Did he try to choke her to make a point? He wouldn’t put it past McCreary.

“I need to go to pee,” he could hear someone saying.

“You can take a piss when you’re free to go,” he could hear one of the enforcers spit out.

“Come on, you’re seriously going to let her hold it?” another enforcer argued. “Let her go to the nearest bush.”

The sound of the two enforcers arguing about allowing someone to go to the bathroom in the woods dominated the air for a minute. And it seemed that the minute stretched into longer than that.

And that minute turned into a minute and a half until his voice hit the speakers. And oh did the sound of it grate Bellamy’s ears. “Apparently, a branch hit one of the mines upon investigation,” he announced. “You are all free to return to what you are doing, but I’ll warn you: attempt to leave the valley, and that’s how you’ll go. And it’s not a road that I know that all of you don’t want to take.”

Bellamy frowned. Something didn’t seem right about this picture. Like there was something that McCreary didn’t want them to know.

“A tree branch? Really?” Harper demanded as the group dissipated.

“If it was, it probably was a big one.” Wells shook his head. “None of this makes sense.”

None of it did. Like McCreary was afraid that whatever actually caused the mines to activate would complicate things for him. Bellamy shuddered, as it reminded him of when Octavia burned the hydro farm after Monty declared that he revived it and that the valley wasn’t a necessity.

A decision which landed them in this predicament. A decision that led them to the deaths of his sister and the majority of Wonkru.

Bellamy went back to one of the sections in the valley where he was working before they were all herded together. The section that was nearly complete and only needed finishing touches done. From what he heard, McCreary’s cabin was off to the corner surrounded by trees, which was confirmed when he saw something draped in fabric being towed towards that direction.

The crib for the coming baby. If Bellamy had his way, he would make that Diyoza was spirited away before the infant was ever born. McCreary’s first child turned out okay, but this was different. This little girl was more at risk of adopting her father’s sociopathy. Though he hoped that Dani and Diyoza would be a positive influence.

Ideally, they could all break out of here before the baby was born. Realistically, however, it would be impossible. The mines would make it extremely difficult, and playing hopscotch around them would be playing a deadly game of Russian Roulette.

As without Clarke –

He asked Diyoza about his methods in division. Bellamy might as well go to him and request to talk Clarke. Just to see what McCreary would pull on him.

And after fastening a door to one of the cabins, he went to his destination.

* * *

“A tree branch? No one is going to believe that,” Clarke pointed out, crossing her arms. What did he think these people were? Idiots?

“Even so, they are not going to risk investigating with the danger of being blasted to death,” he argued, turning to her. “Something that I know full well that you don’t want for your friends.”

Friends? Were they even her friends if she put them in danger? “Friends are not complacent in other friend’s oppression,” she made known. “If I was their friend, they wouldn’t have been in this situation.”

Like a shark, it was like he smelled from where that came from. “Your role in this is the reason why they are alive,” he indicated, “though they don’t seem to think that. Fickle and ungrateful, are they?”

Except for Wells and Bellamy, Raven and Murphy – especially Raven – were critical if they thought she did the wrong thing. Same for Jasper. Things is, they were right anyway. Wells and Bellamy saw goodness that wasn’t even there to begin with. “In the times where I saved them or thought I did, they didn’t take it well.”

McCreary curled his lips into a smirk. “They heap all the work on you so they can shit on you later if it doesn’t go how they wanted it,” he noted. “They are not worth your time, then. Anyone who simply wants a scapegoat for when things go wrong shouldn’t be worth your energy.”

She swallowed, feeling something in her break. Maybe they did rely on her just to have a scapegoat. To have someone to blame if it didn’t go how they wanted to. Jasper was upset with Mount Weather, and she doubted that he fully forgave her before he died. Arkadia was upset with her for the list, and now Raven and Murphy had turned against her for something they would have done had they been in her shoes.

The fact was, McCreary wasn’t wrong.

“Maybe you’re right,” she murmured.

“Sorry if it just became apparent,” he replied, walking around her. Placing a hand on her shoulder. “Parents, do anything for their young, something that they don’t get. I get it. I made sure that my daughter and the other one on the way would have a better life, and I succeeded. Just as you made sure that your daughter had a better life. See, we’re not all that different.”

“Not all different,” she repeated, even if she came to that conclusion the night before. Not all different. Wanheda. Graveyard. They have both killed, hurt people, at the expense of others.

_Maybe there are no good guys._

There were good guys. She just wasn’t one of them.

* * *

As he was nowhere to be found, Bellamy figured that he was at the bridge. No one paid any mind to him as he traveled through the corridors. Not even Clarke as she walked past him. Something had to have happened for her to avoid him like this.

Whatever McCreary did, Bellamy wanted to wrap his hands around his neck and slam him against any kind of surface. But he wasn’t the same person six years ago that landed on the ground. He had grown from that.

Bellamy balled his fists when the lion in the room turned his eyes to him. Like a predator waiting to make the kill should he make one stupid decision.

“Anything I could do for you, Bellamy?” McCreary inquired. His tone made it evident that whatever Bellamy was going to ask him anyway was out of the question. So why bother asking that question? Unless he reveled in the emotional pain as well as the physical pain in others. Must be as he seemed to want people to watch him torture or kill their loved ones.

“Is there a way I could see Clarke?” he asked him. “I hadn’t had a conversation with her since before Madi’s fall.”

“Why, she just left to overlook the western quadrant to make sure that the enforcers don’t kill anyone, even if they don’t mean to,” he answered lazily. “Had you stopped by earlier, you two could have talked.”

She could have when she passed him in the hall, but she didn’t. There was also some satisfaction in McCreary’s voice at the idea of them not seeing each other. He wasn’t bothering trying to hide it.

“She answers to you, so why not you have her come back here?” he demanded, even if it was a risky maneuver.

“While that may be true, I have no control over her private life,” he spat out, stalking towards him. “Clarke does what she wants, and if she wanted you to see her, she would have. With that girl of hers in a coma and whatnot, her attention is going to be elsewhere. If I were you, I would stop wasting your time if she doesn’t desire to have anything to do with you.”

Manipulation was one of the markers of a sociopath, and Bellamy knew that McCreary was already one. Had not he gone to Diyoza, he would have fallen for those slick words.

“I see,” Bellamy nodded, and he could see on McCreary’s face that he didn’t get the desired effect. For his fists were clenching and his neck chords were sticking out. Even if he didn’t provoke him, his lack of reaction seemed to anger him. Bellamy feared that McCreary would find an excuse to get his fix of pain.

“Why don’t you get out of my sight,” McCreary spat out, the venom in his eyes suggesting that bad things would happen if he didn’t, “because if you don’t for another minute, you would wish you weren’t born.”

Bellamy strode from the room, as it seemed that McCreary made good on his threat. One of these days, Bellamy was going to make McCreary regret that he ever returned back to Earth.

As he leaves, he sees McCreary pick up the radio.

* * *

As much as she liked her rock music, Dani opted to play some radio play (which was downloaded on the previous owner’s mp3 player) made by Canadian students back when the Earth was vibrant with life, and not some devasted planet. Partly because it seemed that one of her new companions seemed annoyed by her constant desire to play it.

Even if she didn’t say anything. Well, might as well tune it to something different so this high and mighty tech queen won’t complain later.

“…and while no official word has reached our newsroom regarding an attack against – ” said the actor before he was stylistically cut off. As if there were actual interference. For a student production, this was good. It would even put Orson Wells to shame.

“You could put it back to your music if you like,” she heard Raven suggest as she was still working on a charger base for the radios. “I didn’t say that you couldn’t listen to it.”

“You were getting rather annoyed every time I played the MP3 player,” she answered. “It’s not unusual to get sick of hearing the same kind of music every day. Except if you like that genre.”

Dani could say that she gets sick of her too sometimes, though she doesn’t doubt that Raven knows that already. Just as Raven seems sick of being around her at times too.

“Yeah, sometimes it gets old,” Raven agreed.

Dani nodded as she returned to her tasks. Not ignoring the fact that Raven was muttering under her breath. It had to be about Clarke as she was saying her name. Not to mention that fact that she saw her take a dig at her from time to time as if she didn’t help sell out Shaw.

“Do you have hobbies to do when angry? Write a diary?” she asked.

“What do you mean?” Raven asked as if it was a ludicrous assumption. “Right here in front of me is my hobby.”

“Yes, but diaries are good too,” she pointed out. “That you don’t misdirect your anger.”

“Misdirecting anger and telling it as it is are not the same thing,” Raven maintained.

“As if you didn’t allow your friend to sell out Shaw, leading him to get beat up and shock-collared and electrocuted for the fun of it,” Dani pointed out. “Don’t act so innocent, princess.”

“I didn’t want that to happen,” Raven argued.

“But you still allowed it to,” Dani pointed out. “Also, just between you and me, at least Clarke was thinking about her daughter and her mom when she sided with my dad. You and your friends, on the other hand, were just interested in saving your own asses when you instigated that riot which put my dad in power and brought us here in the first place.”

Just as it seemed that Raven was starting to digest that info, the curtain was moved to the side. Revealing Echo, her partner in crime.

“I found some blueberries if any of you want them,” Echo offered, carrying a bowl. Blueberries. Yum.

“No, I’ll pass,” Raven refused. “I don’t want my bowels to start while working on something.”

“Thanks.” Dani takes the bowl from Echo’s hand. “Want some? I can’t eat all these by myself.”

Echo hesitated before taking a handful. “I never ate blueberries before.”

“Why?” she asked.

“I lived somewhere cold and icy,” Echo divulged.

“Hmm, they shouldn’t disappoint,” Dani shared as Echo took a bite; feeling herself beam at Echo’s awestruck expression after taking a bite. She liked it when others enjoyed what she liked.

Which was opposite for her dad’s insatiable appetite for other’s pain.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To ease any confusion, Sarah McCreary is the sister of Simone Lightbourne. Yep, Josie and Graveyard, two of our sociopaths, are related in this fic.


	5. Chapter Five

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> SHOW DAY! Today’s the day we see our favs for the very last season. 
> 
> To ease any confusion, here is an overview of the changes I made with canon regarding Team Alpha/Sanctum. As this takes place a little over two hundred years instead of the canonical ninety-seven (103 if you count the six year time jump), the Primes are in the bodies they were in when Eligius IV landed (and sadly, yes, that means sweet Delilah Workman had been wiped to become Priya Desai VII three years prior to the events of this fic; for obvious story reasons, it’s not feasible for Clarke to be Josie’s current and eighth host). Not to mention that I added an few more Primes as evidenced by the last chapter, making it eighteen instead of thirteen. Regarding their situation with Hosts, it’s not as bad as in canon but they don’t have as many as they want.
> 
> As for Gabriel not defecting, it will be explained…

Madi had woken up that afternoon. Just as Clarke was heading off to lunch when she was notified to head to the gas station. Even if Madi’s condition was improving, Clarke feared the worst.

It’s when they perk that people often die. Clarke heard that before when learning under her mom.

She burst through the door. Even at the joy of seeing Madi sitting up and well, guilt filled her. Because of her, she would never walk again. Had someone been there with her; had Bellamy been there, Madi wouldn’t have fallen.

Clarke collapsed as she reached the table. Taking hold of Madi’s hands and weeping, “Madi, I’m so sorry. I’m sorry.”

“It’s not your fault, Clarke,” Madi tried to assure. Her voice sounded groggy, as she just woke up from her coma. Her brain had to adjust.

Clarke shook her head. No matter what Madi said, the guilt was still lying in her stomach. This all could have been avoided, and due to her own negligence, she allowed this to happen.

Madi was carried to the cabin. The housing section was halfway done, though all they had to do was move some of the furnishings.

It was simple. Two rooms, with some furniture that was probably transported from the mothership. In the main room, Clarke could see what could only be a handmade crib. Further cementing the reality of the oncoming baby.

Her mom was going to need some help with the delivery. Knowing McCreary, he wouldn’t make it easy for her mom. Probably breathing down her neck the entire time. Clarke needed to be there, just to make it easier.

“I can’t feel my legs,” Madi could be heard saying as she was settled onto one of the twin beds in the next room.

“I’m sorry,” Clarke apologized, holding back the tears. “Raven is going to make you a brace like the one that she has. To help you walk.”

Madi didn’t say anything else, and Clarke wasn’t blind by the tears glistening in her eyes. At this point, Clarke’s words were lodged in her throat. Like they were there, but it was difficult for them for her to say it.

“Now I’ll be right back with lunch,” she assured to her. “Are you hungry?”

Madi shook her head no. As she had just woken up, her hunger probably didn’t register to her. Clarke nodded before walking away. Turning away quickly so that Madi wouldn’t see her tears.

Wiping her eyes with her arm as she leaves the cabin. Looking around the woods. Whoever these people were, they were probably grieving the loss of their death. Perhaps figuring out what happened to their dead and how to proceed from there.

There was a very faint desire to take the risk and help these people. But that was pushed away with the idea that it wouldn’t have mattered. She didn’t know what their intentions were.

_They aren’t your concern_ , whispered a dark voice in the back of her mind. _What use would they be to you anyway?_

Clarke conceded that the voice in her mind was right. What good would come from helping them or working with them? It will only backfire.

She returned her gaze towards her route. Pushing away all thoughts of offering assistance. If it were weeks ago, when she was blinded by the fact that she wasn’t the bad guy, she would have.

Things were different now. Things weren’t the same as they were a month ago.

* * *

“So, there are people out there?” Monty asked Dani once the two of them were alone in her workshop.

It was a risky maneuver. Asking one of the Eligius miners to see if it was actually a tree branch that triggered the mines around the valley. Especially the daughter of the mass murderer that was in control of the valley. She could easily go to her dad and repeat what was said in a conversation, putting him in a bad situation.

But Monty trusted his gut, and his gut told him that she was trustworthy. If Wells trusted her, he should too.

“I’m going to say that we’re performing a routine check on the satellite to see if it’s working how it’s supposed to. No one would be asking questions,” Dani said.

Being an certain sociopathic murderer’s daughter, they wouldn’t suspect anything. “They probably would think that you were teaching me how to operate the thing.”

Her lips curled into a smirk. “I love your brain, Green,” she commented. “No wonder your girlfriend loves you.”

Harper didn’t say that he was one of the smartest ones of the room for nothing. Harper did say that his brains were what she loved about him.

“She doesn’t have poor taste,” was what he could manage as someone steps into the van. Pounding on the inside of the wall.

“What is it, Gellert?” Dani asked, the irritation visible in her tone. “Can’t you see that I’m busy.”

In the past two weeks, Monty observed that Gellert seemed to be the most sadistic of all the enforcers. In the past hour, he thought he had seen her smirk as she pistol-whipped someone that was slow. Probably from McCreary’s faction.

That would explain it.

“Your dad wants to talk to you,” she answers. “He seems pissed.”

Dani rolled her eyes. “What happened this time?” she answered, throwing her hands up in the air before leaving in a huff. Monty sensed that even if things weren’t strained between Dani and her dad before, they might be now. She even made faces and rolled her eyes when she would speak with him over the radio sometimes.

Perhaps she was lucky for being able to throw whatever snark she could at him without being tortured for it.

“What are you looking at?” Gellert snapped, her glare so piercing that he might as well be six feet under.

“Nothing,” he said.

“Look at me again, I might as well stab your eyes out,” she threatened, pointing her knife upwards. She curls her lips into a smirk before stepping out of the van.

When they decide to pull out the rug from under McCreary, Monty hoped that he and Harper could be the ones to take her down before they take down McCreary.

* * *

“I offered them blueberries, and she literally took the whole bowl,” Echo relayed to Bellamy. “They say that best way to get through somebody is through their stomach.”

Bellamy gathered Echo, Raven, Monty, and Harper on their scheduled dinner break. Huddled closely so no one could easily hear them. The church was practically free from Eligius mooks.

Dani McCreary. The daughter of the very mass murderer in charge of this valley. “You picked the one closest to the leader,” he said. “Good call.”

“Probably only by blood,” Echo commented. “Their relationship seems to get strained by the days.”

It did seem strained, even if he was not acquainted with the McCrearys’ for an extended time. Dani had an obvious problem with her dad’s sadism, and he seemed to think that Dani had a weak stomach for pain. “Though not strained enough to betray him,” he pointed out.

She was his daughter, after all.

“She keeps talking about how her dad killed the Eligius’ first doctor,” Monty pitched in. He snorts. “If you heard her, you would see that she resents him for that. Even if it’s not strained to that point of betrayal, that doesn’t mean that it won’t get to that point.”

“That doesn’t mean that we should trust her,” Raven said. “Think: she’s the closest one to McCreary, which means she is more likely to stab us in the back.”

“We don’t have to trust her,” Harper pointed out.

No. They don’t have to trust her. This wasn’t about trust, to begin with. “No one said that this was about trust,” he pointed out. “Echo just has to get close enough to her in order to get into his inner circle.”

“Though I don’t doubt that one also has to do terrible things to get into that son of a bitch’s inner circle,” Raven pointed out. “He wouldn’t just accept you if you got close to his daughter.”

McCreary’s inner circle were composed of those just like him: criminals willing to torture people to get their next fix. Gellert one of them. There was no doubt that Echo would be forced to do the things she used to do willingly.

“It’s worth the risk,” Echo put out.

“Better you then me then,” Raven put forth. “I’m not one to risk my humanity for a good cause.”

“As if we all didn’t lose our humanity at some point,” Bellamy could hear Harper mutter to herself. Bellamy could understand Harper’s irritation. Ever since McCreary took the valley, Raven took on this attitude as if she had never made any of the morally questionable decisions that the rest of them had made. As if she wasn’t okay with taking Madi to an active warzone. “Aside from Echo, what else can hold us over until Clarke –”

“Waiting for Clarke is not an option,” Raven hissed, cutting Harper off. “We can’t depend on the very bitch who’s the reason we are all on this situation. Not when she’s his right hand.”

“Oh, you’re going to forget that you and Murphy orchestrated that riot?” Monty demanded. “Bellamy and Clarke were working behind the scenes to deescalate the situation between Diyoza and the bunker, but you ruined that because you thought it was more important to get out and save yourselves then to wait. You don’t get to point B without point A, Raven!”

If nothing else succeeded, it seemed that Monty started turning the wheels in Raven’s head. Raven being Raven, she might argue, but she was closer to Monty when it came to the original hundred. Raven swallowed a tinge of guilt in her eyes.

“I mean, we shouldn’t have to rely on Clarke when there is always a problem,” she backpedaled. “I think we can do this without her.”

And Raven was still arrogant enough to suggest that they can even do this without Clarke’s strategic thinking. Clarke, who was currently around McCreary almost all the time, would tell them what they needed to take him down.

Clarke might not be an option now, as Madi’s wellbeing was her priority (not to mention the troubling fact that she was avoiding him), but that didn’t mean that she was never going to be an option.

“We can try yes. If we succeed is the major question,” Monty pointed out.

Without Clarke, their plans had a slim chance of ever ending with the desired outcome. But here’s to trying.

Outside, they hear a gunshot.

* * *

“Are you out of your mind!” Clarke could hear Dani exclaim as she rushed to the source of the gunshot. The first thing she saw was Dani swipe the gun from Gellert’s hand. “One human dead is still enough to put our existence at risk.”

“He was pissing me off!” Gellert hissed as Clarke noticed a dead body at their feet. An ashen girl standing near; brains on her shoulder.

“Only because you provoked him first,” the young girl hissed, and within seconds, the butt of Gellert’s gun hits her temple. Knocking her to the ground.

Clarke could feel one train of thought tug at her as well as another. That moral side of her was still trying to make itself prominent, but it was no match for the darkness that was filling her veins.

Why should she help her? She didn’t even know her.

Dani walks off, radio in hand. “Dad, Tabby just killed someone,” she could hear her say in a shaking voice. Anyone around her would think that Dani was wasting her time. That her dad wouldn’t care that someone died. Not knowing that the enforcers were not allowed to kill people unless he permitted it.

And she heard his response moments later. “Send her in now,” he said. Most likely he muttered a string of profanities beforehand and what Clarke could get from his tone was that he was pissed.

All Clarke could do was manage a smirk when Gellert turned her heated gaze to her. “Too bad you didn’t get the ‘do not kill’ memo,” Clarke managed.

She thought that she saw Gellert raise her gun –

“My dad wants to see you ASAP, Gellert,” Dani told her. “And I can pretty much say that he’s pissed.”

Clarke watched as the blood drained from Gellert’s face before she high tailed it out of there. Probably doesn’t want to get flayed for being a few seconds late.

“Clean that up,” Clarke ordered, referring to the corpse on the ground, “and go get a stretcher.”

It wasn’t her current priority to help someone get to her mom and to help clean up someone’s brains. Why should it? She had things to do, like getting dinner for her and Madi.

From the corner of her eye, she thought she saw Bellamy and the others standing outside the church. Probably coming out to see what was happening. She felt guilty for not looking at him. For ignoring him during the entire day. Part of her wanted to go over there and warn him how to defend himself if an enforcer was homicidal.

One part insisted that it was best not to talk to him. That it’s better off that way. Bellamy was good, and she didn’t want to poison him with her influence. He deserved better than to be around her.

Clarke turned away from them in favor of getting dinner for herself and Madi. Going to the completed food store on her right. Kane was going to find dinner for her mom, so she didn’t need to worry about her. 

Clarke picked up two of the metallic packages. These rations from the ship could only go so long, and it will not be long until they go to what they have in the valley. Well, they couldn’t waste anything.

“Come on, I don’t bite,” she could hear Simmons say in frustration as she entered the cabin. Like he was having a hard time coaxing a kid to eat something. Stepping into the second room, Clarke observed him trying to offer Madi a silver-wrapped sandwich

Madi, lying on the bed, mustered a glare. It was clear that Madi didn’t trust him.

“Actually, I was going to give her dinner,” Clarke said as she entered the room. “Thanks, though.”

“Well, I guess you can have better luck than me,” he said sheepishly. “Like, I didn’t do anything to her.”

Clarke nodded. Obviously, this guy was among the non-violent of the group. Though his technical prowess wasn’t enough to override the loop of the Eye. She watched him leave the room before approaching Madi.

“I brought us dinner,” she said, setting down the boxes and opening one of them. Cold ham, potatoes, and arugula.

Madi gazes at it before turning to her. “I’m not hungry.”

Clarke exhaled. “You have to eat, Madi,” she said, almost pleading. She sat on the bed. “We can’t waste food around here.”

“Or else he beat us?” Madi asked weakly. “Anyway, what use would I be to him anyway if I can’t walk?”

She closed her eyes. Clarke knew that this would come up. That Madi would see herself as easily expendable to McCreary for her disability. She had to assure Madi that everything will be alright. That she will not die. “I will make sure that doesn’t happen,” Clarke insisted. “You know the brace Raven has? She is going to give you one so it would help you walk.”

Madi gazes at Clarke long and hard. “I don’t want you to buddy up to him just to make sure I’m okay,” she says. “He could still kill us.”

Buddy up to him. Perhaps it was best that Madi didn’t know what she actually did with him and what she might keep doing.

“You could have allowed me to kill him when I had the chance,” said Madi. “I would have died, but it would have been better than this.”

At that, Clarke could feel her heart shatter in a million pieces. “Madi,” she rasped, feeling her eyes prick with tears, “you don’t mean that.”

“I do, Clarke,” Madi maintained. “I’d rather be dead.”

Clarke swallowed, not willing to show Madi how much that broke her heart. “I’ll leave you alone,” she said, heartbreaking by that very decision.

Even if she herself needed to be alone. Letting the tears come as she ate her dinner.

* * *

“You don’t laugh at one’s misfortune,” Miles Shaw’s father would tell him when he was a boy. Though that didn’t stop his satisfaction as he watched Tabitha Gellert limp through the village. Holding her side as the black blood dripped from her nose.

Dani could only raise her eyebrow in confusion as Gellert glared at her.

“How is it my fault?” Dani demanded as she picked up a spoonful of her soup. “Someone else would have told my dad anyway.”

Dani wasn’t wrong, as any one of these people would have been happy to tell McCreary in order to gain his confidence. It was easy to blame Dani because she happened to be his daughter, and it was no secret that a fraction of McCreary’s faction resented her for that.

“What’s new in the day and the life of you?” he asked, noting that hostility that he saw earlier.

“She’s not going to like me anytime soon if I am to be honest,” Dani answered. “She might not retaliate now, but you can bet I will watch my back when she recovers.”

She wasn’t wrong, though more likely Gellert would be trying to look for an excuse to get back at her. Even with McCreary’s current policy of “Touch her in any way or you’ll wish you never lived.”

It might never change, but with the way things were now, Shaw wasn’t sure. He wouldn’t be surprised if Dani tried to find a way to stab her dad in the back. All Shaw had to see what the last straw would be.

McCreary killing the doctor right after the mutiny was just the kicker.

He watches Monty and Dani join up and depart for Dani’s satellite before going off to Abby Griffin’s station at the gas station. After all, he did have an appointment to check the status of his leg. He wasn’t limping as bad, which meant he might be saying goodbye to the crutches.

“The bone is healing up,” Abby observed after performing an x-ray. “No infection on the surface either.”

“But not enough progress to get rid of the crutches,” he finished. He didn’t want to come off as too confident.

“After next week is the prognosis.” He gets off the table as Abby turns off the equipment. Seeing her scratch her forehead with her fingers. She had gone for nearly a month without pills, but she didn’t have the shakiness of a withdrawal.

It was as if she appeared a year older then when he last saw her. As if the stress was eating away from it. And Shaw could pinpoint the cause of the stress.

“I got your back, okay?” he says, trying to assure her as he touched her shoulder. “Make sure that nothing happens to you, okay?”

Abby nods, moving his hand away from her shoulder.

“I keep telling myself that it has to get better,” Abby musters. “Even if I have doubts every now and then. One doesn’t know if they are going to step on the wrong eggshell around him.”

Shaw didn’t want to point out the truth in those words, as it took not much to set McCreary off.

And it didn’t help that he went on for a few weeks without torturing anyone. And it’s like Shaw’s gut told him that sooner or later, McCreary might find an excuse to get his fix.

* * *

The blaring of the siren punctures Bellamy’s ears as he sleeps. Groaning, he turns over in his cot. Sleeping hours began just a couple hours ago.

Why the need to activate the siren?

“Get up!” Gellert’s voice cracked through. Even if she tried to sound authoritative, she still seemed hoarse. “You don’t want to be forced out of bed, do you?”

He lifted up his head before reluctantly disentangling himself from his blankets. Gellert was still trying to hold herself as if her past injuries from that recent beating didn’t affect her. From what Bellamy wagered, it seemed that McCreary was only upset because someone else pulled the trigger on someone else.

That only he could kill people.

“It’s the middle of the night,” he heard someone say. “Why are they getting us up?”

“Unless he wants to exhaust us,” says another.

Another horrifying possibility arose in his head. If someone had tried to get out and were caught, Bellamy wouldn’t put it past McCreary to force them out of bed to simply watch someone get punished.

He prayed that it wasn’t the case, but what else could it be?

They were ushered from the church and led through the night. The sleepy fuzz still lingering in his brain. Seeing three people on the ground, their wrists bound together confirmed the fears that he had.

“It would be so easy to allow you to run to your gory deaths,” McCreary starts, “but there’s not enough of us to come by for that.”

Looking over from McCreary’s disturbing anticipation to Clarke’s apathy was enough to send chills down Bellamy’s spine. Though Clarke’s indifference was what horrified him more. She was Clarke, but at the same time, it wasn’t her.

It was like she was already turning into another person. What was he doing to her?

McCreary turns his head back to one of the three people on the ground. “Take her to the pole,” he orders. Bellamy’s heart nearly leaps from his throat as he sees the teenaged girl being forced up her feet.

He moves to stop it, even risking getting a round of the collar. But Clarke’s warning glare stops him. People would see it as the monster’s right hand silently threatening him away, but to Bellamy, the Clarke he knew was showing through.

Miller stepped forward, but he was stopped by Roan and Wells as the tearful girl was chained to the pole. An Eligius inmate rips open the back of her shirt.

“No, stop!” Niylah steps forward. “Let me take it. I’ll –”

A round of the shock collar interrupts her. Horror filling him as she convulses from the electric shocks. The jeers of the inmates around them filling the air as Bellamy kneels by her side. Harper and Monty joining him.

Bellamy looked up to see Clarke take the handle of the whip, and for a brief moment, he could see the conflict in her eyes. As if she was debating whether to carry out this gruesome punishment or not.

At that crack of the whip and the hearing of the girl yelp in pain, Bellamy could feel himself wince. Even if he wasn’t receiving the punishment, it was like he still felt the pain as if he was receiving it as well.

Even if he didn’t know this girl.

Bellamy continues to avert his eyes when the other two get whipped. He didn’t stomach seeing things like this, as seeing people in pain turned his stomach. But also it was Clarke who was the one wielding the whip that made it hard.

When it was all over, Bellamy helped Niylah and Valencia – one of the Wonkru survivors – tend their wounds. Covering the lacerations with a cloth coated with a paste made with plants.

Bellamy couldn’t get rid of the image of Clarke in his eyes. The initial apathy on her face and the picture of her wielding that whip was hard for him to process.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't forget to share your thoughts. Reviews are welcome


	6. Chapter Six

“There were three people running towards the perimeter,” she could hear the radio crackle near the bed. Clarke let out a groan. Why can’t she just sleep? Was anything sacred around here?

Next to her, she could feel him lean over to pick up the radio. “Can you tell me how far they were from the minefield were when you caught them?” McCreary asks. That slight anticipation in his voice at the idea of doling out punishment.

“At five feet,” was the answer. Not too far then. They were close to stumbling on them by the sound of it.

“Bring them here so I can see them,” he says, sitting up on the bed before leaving it. Clarke shifts under the covers as he looks at her. “Get dressed.”

_As if you’re not the one that’s still butt naked_ , she thought to herself with annoyance as she leaned over the bed to grab her clothes. Clarke was mortified that he was willing to get it on with her while was Madi sleeping in the next room, for she could easily hear what was going on. “Then you’ll just have to be quiet, won’t you?” were his words.

That didn’t mean that Madi wouldn’t hear the creaking of the bed from the next room. Clarke was hoping that she was sound asleep and didn’t listen to it.

By the time they were both dressed, three enforcers had pushed in three people into the cabin. Forcing them on their knees to face them. The three of them violently shaking as their frightened faces gazed up.

Without a doubt, it was towards her as well.

“Well, well, what a bunch,” he leered, looking over the near escapees like a lion that had an abundance of prey. His eyes locked with the sole girl of the group, and Clarke could see her eyes widen in fear. Even Clarke inched forward as he ran his fingers on the strands of hair under the girl’s ear in case he did anything. “It would have been easy to let you blow to up until there was nothing left but blood and bones,” he mused as he drew his hand away, “but we’re in limited quantity anyway, so this calls for a good old fashioned flogging.” Then louder, “Get everyone up! These three need to be made an example of.”

Wait, what?

“I think it’s best if we wait until morning to –” she started.

“People have been dragging their people out of bed to witness punishments throughout time,” he interrupted, not hiding his irritation. “So there is no problem waking people up from their sleep and get the message.”

No problem waking up people to get the message. Why was she disputing him anyway?

“Activate the wake-up call when we arrive at the punishment block,” he orders through the radio as the three are pushed to their feet. Clarke peeks into the neighboring room to see that Madi was still fast asleep before following McCreary out the door.

The grass crunched under their feet as they walked through the night. The cicadas and the crickets making their nightly calls in the trees. The young girl’s sobbing continuing as they neared the punishment block.

And Clarke tried burying any sympathy. Bad guys weren’t meant to be sympathetic.

The siren started blaring when they entered the punishment block, and Clarke watched as the enforcers on watch retreated to the chapel and the erected tents to summon the sleeping occupants. With the housing almost done, they should be able to move from where they are currently sleeping.

One problem: the enforcers and those in the inner circle get first pick on who gets the cabins. Though her mom and Kane are expected to move into their housing the next morning.

Gradually, everyone filtered out of the structures and towards the punishment block. Faces heavy with sleep. Some of them even confused why they were forced out of bed in the first place.

Yet some got the idea why they were summoned out of bed at this time of night, especially the horror on their faces when they see that they have three people on their knees.

“It would be so easy to allow you to run to your gory deaths,” McCreary starts, “but there’s not enough of us to come by for that.”

From the corner of her eyes, she saw Bellamy looking from McCreary to her. Clarke even thought that she saw the blood drain from his face. Most likely seeing how she was wearing her apathy on her face.

It had started to click to him that the Head wasn’t who he thought she was.

She could taste the tension and horror in the crowd, especially when McCreary turned his attention to the young girl. “Take her to the pole,” he orders.

Clarke swore that she thought she saw Bellamy take one step forward. The determination on his face as if he wanted to stop it. Was he stupid? He could get electrocuted. Clarke locked eyes with him, sending him a glare. That he would take it as a message to back off.

Its effect was instantaneous. Understanding dawned on his face as he took a step back. As if he knew that she did not want him to step forward. That she wasn’t going to allow him to get a round of the collar.

The heart pounds in her chest as one of the Eligius crew rips open the back of the girl’s shirt. Given McCreary’s anticipation, it seemed that this was arousing him. Clarke wouldn’t be surprised if he wanted to get laid after this.

And a twinge of nausea settled in the pit of her stomach. Who gets turned on by this?

“No, stop!” Niylah exclaims from the crowd. “Let me take it. I’ll –”

A round of electricity comes on, and Clarke doesn’t want to bring herself to witness Niylah convulsing. She knows what will happen: that goodness might try and emerge, only to be drowned by the darkness.

Noticing Gellert looking eagerly at the whip, Clarke holds her hand out to take it. McCreary raises his eyebrow incredulously at her before handing it to her. Probably didn’t think that she would have the guts.

_I’m just as bad_ , she thinks, though there seemed to be a struggle within her. Was she actually a monster that would inflict pain, or was she the hero that would usually drop the whip and step down?

_Wait, screw it. You’re not one of the good guys anyway_.

She turns to the subject, and without hesitation, she cracks the whip.

The girl’s cries fill the night as Clarke lashes the cables against her skin. Counting the lashes with her heartbeats.

One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, …and after twelve she stops.

Twelve.

Clarke doesn’t even fight the conflict within her as she whips the second person. As if the darkness was swarming her this very moment as if that good that she thought she once had was struggling to fight it’s way up. But she doesn’t miss Bellamy’s face as she carries out the gruesome task.

As if he couldn’t comprehend what he was seeing.

She couldn’t comprehend it, but this was who she was. Only she wasn’t lying to herself about not a bad guy.

When they were done, she allows Wonkru to tend to them. Even if McCreary would rather have their wounds fester as a reminder of their brazenness.

* * *

“I apologize if it caused alarm. That’s what you get for trying to venture into unknown territory. Now, I’d rather speak with you face to face then through an radio. Tell me you’re willing to talk things out and I’ll send out some people to get you. You have forty-eight hours and trust me, that’s a road you don’t want to go on if you don’t meet that deadline.”

When they heard those words on the radio, Gabriel had watched as the blood drained from Sarah’s face. Her lip quivering as she whispered, “Paxton?” Almost as if she had never expected to hear his voice again even if she knew he might be there. Those among the Primes knew that Sarah’s husband and daughter were arrested on charges related to New York’s Callahan mob. It always seemed to have rubbed Gabriel the wrong way how Sarah was willing to let her daughter, who was only arrested for cyber warfare charges, to be condemned to an mission that would get her killed, as Hythylodium was said to be toxic and could cause various health issues when exposed.

“Right here, if you see with my flashlight,” Jasmine panted as they reached to a stop. Gabriel locked his gaze to where her flashlight was shining. Looking closer at the rocks, he could have sworn that there was a metallic glint on some of these “rocks.”

“How can we tell which one is a rock and which one isn’t?” Rachel asked, her voice shaking. The fear in her voice chilling his blood. Gabriel had never heard this fear in his sister’s voice before ever since the Two Sun Eclipse where Russell went mad and killed almost all of Team Alpha two centuries ago, and that alone sent chills down his spine. And when looking at the “rocks”, it eerily reminded him of the radiation shield guarding Sanctum.

“I mean, why would they mine the entire valley if they think that there was no one outside?” asked Ryker.

That was a good question, though there was only one reason Gabriel could think of. Why mine the perimeter of a valley if you’re the only ones here? To keep people in, it would be.

“If they are not keeping people out, it could only mean that they are keeping in,” Josephine deduced, echoing his thoughts. “My uncle may seem psychotic but this is genius.”

Josie’s fascination with it was just as disturbing as the mines themselves. Gabriel watched in horror as she analyzed the mines before jumping around them.

“Careful!” he called, fearing of what would happen if one of them blew. Not only that she’d blow up but her mind drive would be fried as well. Then again, should they still be doing this? Wiping the minds of people only to replace their consciousness?

When Josephine was done hopscotching, she turns back; gazing expectantly at him. Gabriel swallows hard before retracing Josephine’s steps in the same hopscotch pattern until he was standing next to her.

Not long, Avery followed.

“Avery, no!” Sarah cautioned.

“I’ll be fine, mom,” he sighs in annoyance. “If anything happens, Gabriel is there to preserve my mind drive. No worries.”

Gabriel suspected that Avery only said that to placate his mother, for he too felt the same regret about surviving in another’s body. “Immortality Fatigue,” Avery called it. Though Gabriel himself never wanted to be bought back after his first death from cancer.

As they ventured from the mines, with Sarah and Ryker volunteering to stay behind with Jasmine, Rachel, and Jaime, Gabriel wished that things would not go downhill from there.

* * *

“Are you okay?” Bellamy asked one of the three that were flogged hours ago. The girl that was forced to the whipping pole first.

She groans as she lifts her head from her pillow. “It stings,” she moans.

“I’m going to have Niylah check it in a few hours to make sure that they don’t get infected,” he assured her. “What’s your name?”

“Eda,” she whispers.

Bellamy looks around. Making sure that no one was awake to listen. “Were you guys trying to get out?” he whispered.

“Partly,” she whispered. “You don’t believe what that murderer said about a branch falling, do you?”

“No,” Bellamy whispered. If anyone did believe McCreary, it was because they were only afraid to even question what was out there without him enforcing some sort of physical punishment; like the gruesome display a few hours ago. Last he heard, Monty was doing some project with Dani regarding Dani’s satellite. “What do you think is out there?”

“People, perhaps?” she suggests in a whisper. “Because why else would he try to cover up what actually activated one of the mines? Especially when I saw something that looked like blood on your friend’s hand after she went to check up on the situation.”

Bellamy never actually thought to examine Clarke’s hands, as he was more focused on the bruises on her neck. Bellamy turned his thoughts this morning to see if it was there. To see if he could spot something that he had missed.

And then he saw it. Spots of black blood on Clarke’s hands as well as a piece of fabric clenched between her fingers. Almost as if her hands brushed with it. He knew something was off as that ‘falling branch’ story, and that confirmed it.

Whoever it was, the mines blew them up before they could step further into the valley. That there were people out there. People with the Nightblood like Clarke, Madi, and these Eligius miners have.

Given that Eda was still a little weak from the wounds that she sustained, Bellamy decided not to ask anymore. Pulling the blanket over himself, he closed his eyes. Trying to fall back asleep.

Even if it was challenging to sleep these days. Even if it was hard to sleep now, for that image of Clarke as she held the whip pervaded his thoughts. 

Though the piercing blare of the siren said that sleep wasn’t an option, reminding him that he was going to trudge through another day.

“What did you find, Monty?” he whispered as they filed out of the chapel.

“The radio signals were as clear as day,” he whispered. “They reminded me of the ones by Eligius years ago.”

Bellamy wasn’t an expert in radio signals and wavelengths, unlike Monty, who most likely had spent his free time listening to radio transmissions back on the Ark, but he could get some information from what Monty heard.

However –

“Didn’t Eligius land here just days ago?” he asked.

“That was Eligius IV,” Monty clarified. “There was no other ship following IV, but III was very secretive in it’s objective. Since IV landed, it shouldn’t be an stretch that maybe those from III probably wanted to return here. Eligius IV can’t be the only one.”

Before Bellamy can digest it, Dani approached them.

Bellamy straightened his posture as if they hadn’t whispered. Even if Dani allowed Monty to hear the radio signals.

“Gellert is in one of those moods, so it’s best to steer clear of her,” Dani warned.

“As if some of them are not in their moods as it is,” Monty pointed out.

Dani opened her mouth –

“There seems to be a suspicious activity in the south quadrant food units. Is anybody getting this?”

Suspicious activity. Bellamy could feel the fear filling in every fiber of his body. These people, they didn’t…?

“On it,” they could hear Gellert answer, the anticipation in her voice. “Whoever they are, they are not going anywhere.”

“I might as well check it out as well,” Dani pitched in as soon as she grabbed her radio. “I’ll be there as well.”

“There is no need to,” Gellert argued.

“Might as well be there to make sure that you don’t get carried away,” Dani answers. “Otherwise, the next time dad sees you, you’re dead.”

And without hesitation, she sprints towards her location.

“Tempted to see what is a matter to make sure she doesn’t get killed?” Wells asked from behind them. “I doubt that everyone likes her because she’s his daughter.”

If Gellert had beef with her for that reason, then others must have too. Being the daughter of an leader of an faction of criminals would warrant an target on their back. As if they thought that she was prioritized more over the rest of them.

Though Dani seemed to be able to hold her own.

“I’m going to the workshop,” Monty said. “See what she thinks is the first priority to work on.”

The two parted ways and Bellamy half the mind to see what was going on at that food storage unit. If anything, he could sneak a glance under the guise of carrying one of the piles of chopped wood.

He picks one bundle by its straps and lugged it with him. Trying not to be inconspicuous with the other inmates passing him. He noticed that Echo was there too. Maybe to scope out what was going on.

When he arrived at his destination, it seemed that it didn’t take long to see what was going on. Gellert and another were roughly removing three people from the structure: a young woman with dark brown hair and two men with dark skin, though one was slightly lighter toned then the other. And from the looks of them, very well dressed. As if they didn’t have to rely on reusing clothes over and over again.

From Bellamy’s peripheral vision, he could see Dani push away one of her peers before he could pat down one of them. Like one of them saw through his intentions, he could feel one of the Eligius mooks approaching him.

“Really, Johnson? He is just minding his own business,” he could hear Dani snap.

“You think that being Graveyard’s little brat gives you the card to boss us around?” Gellert snapped. He could see one of the three new newcomers trying hard not to step in front of her. As if he was afraid of making things even weirder.

“Just be glad that my dad didn’t hear that or else you be in a chokehold,” was her response. “Just get back to work.”

The next thing he knows is the sound of a rifle being slammed against someone’s forehead before Bellamy turns to see Dani fall to the ground.

“Are you kidding me, Gellert? You want Graveyard to scalp us?” shouted one as Echo fled the scene. Presumably, to tell McCreary. Something that might work in her favor for whatever she had to do.

Judging by the fear in one of the miner’s voice, there was no doubt that McCreary’s reaction to his daughter being hit with the butt of a rifle would be violent. At this moment, the young man that wanted to protect Dani makes an move towards her. Mouthing an panicked “No” as he attempts to kneel to her side. Only to be escorted away with the others. Therefore seeding confusion into Bellamy’s mind, as those two were probably never acquainted.

Or maybe this guy just did not like seeing people getting hurt. No matter if he knew them or not.

Bellamy remained inconspicuous as he could. Placing the wood in a pile and if he wanted to leave before McCreary got here, it was in vain.

“Dani!” he could hear him shout. As Bellamy stood to leave, it was a hard concept to see his face etched in concern as he kneeled by his unconscious daughter; unfathomable to observe the rage in his eyes accompanying that. Bellamy had begun to believe that McCreary cared about nothing and nobody, but his own bloodlust but this…it made him seem more human. And that was worse.

Just like at Mount Weather, where most of the residents could have cared less about others if they weren’t their own family.

As Bellamy walked away, he thought he saw McCreary pistol whip Gellert to the ground. Bellamy put it at the top of his list to avoid him today, for he was going to be in the mood where if you looked at him wrong, he’d jump you.

But he was always in those moods. It wasn’t hard to set him off.

* * *

“Can you walk, alright? That’s it.”

Clarke held Madi’s hands as she guided her from the room, the latter having a fitted brace around her leg. She was hesitant letting her hands go, afraid that she would fall.

Yet, to her relief, Madi was able to take a few steps. Even if it was with a limp. Clarke swallowed. Oh, how it hurt to see Madi this way. If she wasn’t this selfish –

“There is something that we both need to see in the hovercraft,” she can hear McCreary page from the radio. “Seems like our new friends over there did not think to contact us before they decided to avoid the mines.”

Clarke remembered hearing from the radio about suspicious activity in one of the food stores. Not long after, she remembered hearing something about Gellert knocking Dani out with her rifle, which most likely put McCreary in a foul mood.

As for McCreary’s other words, something told her that perhaps these people did not trust that simple minded criminals would turn the gun on them regardless of what McCreary said.

She ignored the fact that Raven was narrowing her eyes at her as she picked up her radio. “Okay, I’ll be over there shortly,” she said.

“Sorry,” she apologizes to Madi. “I have something to do, then I should hopefully see you around lunchtime, okay?”

She kisses the top of her head and runs out. Though she could feel Madi’s gaze towards her as she departed. And it didn’t help that Madi was somberly looking on. Oh, how Clarke wished that she could spend an entire day with her like they had before Eligius came down.

And her workload was interfering with that.

Clarke weaved through the morning rush as she approached the hovercraft. It didn’t help that she could feel Bellamy’s gaze as she passed him.

“Did the Eye see them cross?” Clarke asked as she stepped inside.

“No, though I doubt that those in my daughter’s clique of hackers would say anything.” McCreary snorted. “Shouldn’t surprise me, as they seemed to have taken cue from my most of my subordinates not to answer to anyone that they don’t follow. Though maybe they were trying to see if they could cross without being blown to bits.”

So, they have found a way to navigate around the mines as she thought. Wouldn’t have she and her peers felt the same if it were them six years ago?

They are directed to one of the holding cells and the doors slid open. Inside, three people turn to gaze at them as she and McCreary entered. Clarke couldn’t help but be taken aback by how well they dressed; that their clothes weren’t worn over and over by the people before them.

One of them, the girl, turned to them and Clarke didn’t fail to notice that the way she carried herself…the regal grace of it all.

“Well, isn’t this cute,” McCreary tuts as the door closes behind them. “I thought I made it plain to notify us ahead of time if you wanted to talk.”

“Even if you had no intent to kill us, I’d doubt the same would have been said about your men.” The girl twirls a lock of her hair as she speaks. “And by the looks of them, they’d probably would.”

Perhaps given she was their leader given the cadence of her voice when she spoke those words.

“You’re not wrong there,” he admits. “Some of my men can be loose cannons.”

_As if he’s not one himself from time to time_.

“I got to hand it to you, the mines were rather genius,” the leader said with an smile. Two of the guys glancing at her; wide eyed with disbelief. As if her nonchalance of losing one of their own had disturbed them just as fact that they lost their own.

Even it seemed McCreary had took an pause at it. For he raised an eyebrow incredulously, like he couldn’t fathom why this young woman wasn’t an sobbing heap about the loss of one of her own. Why she didn’t seem tense around him compared to the other two with her.

He then nods. “Okay, then. Now, there has got to be reason why you’d decided to leave that new home of yours to come back here. Seems like your ancestors from Eligius III would have gotten too comfortable to the point where they wouldn’t want to send anyone back.”

* * *

“How’s your head?” Wells asked Dani in the gas station that was designated as Abby’s workshop.

Dani curled her lips in her usual smirk. “Well, I had worse,” she admitted. “It could be worse. I could be dead from the tumors that were in my lungs.”

Wells curled his lips into a smile, her deadpan humor fitting the situation that they were in. Even if her status guaranteed that she would not get the short end of the stick around here. Raven would say that he was naïve; that he was risking a knife in the back by feeling a kinship with Dani McCreary.

Though Wells always relied on his gut feeling, as they say, to follow your gut. If his gut was telling him that Dani was one to trust, then he should trust her.

“When my peers and I first came to the ground, the majority weren’t too kind to me,” he said. “Their beef was with my dad, but they took it out on me as I was there instead of him.”

“At least he was not some mass murdering psycho like my dad,” she said.

“It would be an problem if he was,” Wells admitted.

She cracked a smile. “Regardless, it always sucks to be the child of the one in charge,” she muses. “Though some of my dad’s followers were giving me hell before that riot. Always thought that I thought I was better then them because of that.”

“Is that why you did want not bunk in your dad’s cabin?” he asked. “Because that might signal you out further.”

“That is only half of it,” she states. “The big reason is that there are rumors amongst dad’s sycophants and some others that my dad and Clarke are screwing each other. I mean, yeah, I’m over two centuries old because of cryo, but she’s like my age. Though I had my suspicions as Diyoza says that my dad has a kink for pressing fingers against someone’s neck during sex, and Clarke sure does have bruises on her neck. It makes me want to vomit.”

The words didn’t have to register fully for the horror to seed at his stomach. What kind of predator whittles away at someone and gets them at their lowest point to where they take advantage of them? And by causing her physical harm on top of it.

“Shit,” Dani mutters as if she regrets what she had just said. “Maybe I shouldn’t have told you.”

“No, I’m glad you did,” he pointed out. Just the…Wells shook his head. McCreary was simply using Clarke. Plain and simple.

She leaves the building moments after, and Wells inhales before leaving the building shortly after her.

Only he was looking for Bellamy, who he found sorting pillows and blankets.

“Bellamy, can I get you alone?” he asks, looking around as he couldn’t risk being overheard. “It’s about Clarke. I think she is being taken advantage of.”

* * *

The door to one of the second set of holding cells opens with a metallic groan as Clarke enters, McCreary following her.

As unlikely as it seemed, McCreary had allowed the crossing of the rest of the group (when they introduced themselves: Josephine, Gabriel, and Avery, they did not give any last names. Maybe they didn’t have them but the way McCreary dismissed it suggested that he guessed they had an powerful secret). Giving them until tomorrow afternoon to travel here.

“If you’re asking about the mines, we’ll be able to situate safety ramps,” he offered. “Ones that we used for one of the times we had to mine the toxic shit.”

“Surprising, as you did not seem to care that one of our own died from those mines,” said the one who introduced himself as Gabriel.

“It was his fault,” McCreary retorted. “Had he been careful, he’d still be in one piece.”

In the present, Gellert looks up and at the both of them, smirks defiantly. Especially towards him.

“If your daughter didn’t feel the need to give out your marching orders, she wouldn’t have met the end of my rifle,” she spat.

“It seems some of my rules have fallen on death ears,” McCreary retorts. “When I say hands off Dani, it includes every one of those close to me.”

Gellert simply rolls her eyes. Earning an scoff from McCreary as he hands Clarke the remote to the shock collar around her neck. “Perhaps some electricity might humble you,” he retorts. “Though I think that might not be enough.”

Clarke gazed down at the thick remote. This was bound to come up. That she was going to be the one to use it. Swallowing as she grazed over the buttons. That darkness overpowering any warning that was entering her mind about the ramifications of this.

_Say no and step away_

_…but would it hurt to see the power that came with it?_

“Clarke,” he prompted. “Perhaps you should try your hand on this. After all, you’re on the other end of the remote this time.”

_“I wouldn’t do that if I were you. You might burn your fingers_.”

Clarke swallowed, grazing the top of the button. However, given that McCreary’s patience always wears thin, she pushes down on the button.

Gellert lets out an shriek of pain. Grasping the collar with her fingers.

“That’s not enough,” he said, as Gellert laid on the floor. Her face glistening with sweat as she breathed deeply. “You have to press down on it a little longer, like this.”

He presses the button on his own remote and Clarke watches as Gellert convulses on the floor. As long as she did during the three times, she endured under the shock collar. There was that faint voice urging her to back away…

But she threatened Dani, who helped made sure that Madi did not run to an active warzone.

“Now,” McCreary hands the remote back to Clarke as before sauntering over to Gellert. “I don’t think you would have thought you’d be on the receiving end of one of these again. You been given two rounds so far, and that’s not enough.”

She glares at him before turning back to Clarke. “Now, as I told you,” he said. Clarke inhaled as she pressed the button. Counting the seconds during that time, as long as he told her to. Not averting her eyes as Gellert convulsed. Releasing her button when that time was up.

It was then that Clarke had indeed felt a strange sense of power radiating within her. It was enticing to her when it wasn’t beforehand, and that both frightened and excited her at the same time.

One part of her felt ashamed for embracing the sense of power while the other craved more. And it was the latter that was seemed to be latching onto her these days.

The pride that was in his smirk seemed to be fueling that even more.

* * *

When Wells divulged what Dani relayed to him, Bellamy could feel his intestines curdle in disgust.

_“She’s a feisty one, pretty too.”_

It didn’t help that McCreary had a disturbing infatuation with Clarke. Add the fact that he literally had a daughter around that age (if one took the fact that they were in cryo out of the equation).

_It was consensual_ , his mind tried telling him. _Just be glad that he didn’t force himself on her._

But it shouldn’t have negated the fact that he was a sociopathic predator who manipulated her into isolation from those that cared about her, who most likely manipulated her with the “we’re no different” card. That was just as bad, if not worse then a situation if he did force himself on her.

He had to speak to her. Tell her that her friends do want to talk to her. That if he was telling her they didn’t care, that it was a lie. Anything to get Clarke out of that toxic mess that she was pulled into.

He eyed Dani, making her way towards his vicinity; the black blood dried on her forehead. Watching as she spoke with a group of enforcers, which included Murphy.

Bellamy could never understand Murphy’s hypocrisy when it came to him agreeing to enforce brutal punishments while simultaneously crucifying Clarke for being McCreary’s right hand. They both were trying to look out for the ones they loved.

“She showed her true colors when those people were whipped,” he said at one point. “Maybe the ‘high strung and moral princess’ façade was too much for her to show.”

Murphy could fuck himself.

“Now, dad wants you to get everything ready for the crossing of those from Eligius III,” Dani snapped. “You don’t want to get scalped, do you?”

“Dani,” he said once she was away from the group. “Would it hurt to ask you something?”

“Go ahead,” she said. “I won’t bite, unlike my shark of a dad.”

Bellamy swallowed. _Make this quick_. “Is there a way you could get me to meet with Clarke?” he asks. “Thing is, I haven’t spoken with her in a few weeks, and I’m worried about her.”

Dani paused at that question. “That might be a challenge, as that would be considered unauthorized,” she answered. “I’ll tell her that something needs her attention; that way, dad won’t ask questions.”

She arranged for them to meet at one of the cabins that have yet to be occupied and had the vicinity cleared out. The time he spent waiting for her, he paced back and forth in the small cabin.

There is no reason to be anxious, he tried telling himself. She’s your best friend. What is there to be nervous about?

But his mind begged to differ. That maybe he should be nervous.

He stopped his pacing when he heard the door open and watched as Clarke came into the room. She stopped a few steps from the door the moment she locked eyes to him. Her eyes widening in horror as she gazed at him.

“Bellamy, what are you thinking?” she demanded, advancing towards him. “It’s dangerous. Did you ever think…?”

“Clarke, I just came to talk,” he assured her, stomach rolling at the bruises on her neck. If only he didn’t know the context on how she received them. “A friend to a friend.”

Clarke ran her hands through her hair, breathing shallowly. “Bellamy, if I were your friend, I wouldn’t have pointed that gun at you like I did six years ago,” she countered. “I knew how much Octavia meant to you and instead of being difficult, I should have allowed you to open the door.”

“You thought you were trying to save the human race,” he falters, breaking at the self-condemnation at her voice. “The world was ending, and you made a decision that anyone would make during those circumstances.” He gets his bearings, wondering what to say next. “Just because you think you’re a monster, you shouldn’t be seeking kinship with a man that is one.”

“There is no difference between me killing three hundred innocent people in Mount Weather and McCreary killing people on behalf of a New York mob,” she answered, shaking her head.

“Clarke…” he rasped, his heart breaking over the fact that she was stooping to his level, “…it was either their people or ours,” he pointed out. “Cage Wallace gave us no choice.”

“Bellamy, people die when I’m in charge,” she said. “Wasn’t that what you said to me six years ago?”

“I…” Bellamy began, remembering that day; the anger in his voice during that time. “…I never meant that, Clarke. I was in a dark place, and my emotions got the best of me. Clarke, we survived because of you. From our first days on the ground…”

“The majority of Wonkru is dead because I told McCreary that the Eye was down and that you were coming,” she argued, chords sticking from her neck. “Your sister is dead because of me. I allowed a missile to destroy TonDC and allowed many people to die. So, yes, Bellamy, people have died while I was in charge.”

“You’re not a murderer, Clarke!” he stressed.

“It’s who I always been,” she said, echoing the very words he said to her three years ago. “Bellamy, the Clarke you thought I was doesn’t exist. I was something that I wasn’t. I was led to believe that there were no good guys when actually, there are. I’m just not one of them. I’m not the Head to your Heart, Bellamy. Bellamy, I’d rather you let me go then assign a label that doesn’t apply to me.”

She leaves the cabin, and that was when Bellamy felt something within him break. There was no way he was going to let go of Clarke after they have been through the unthinkable.

Bellamy exhaled as he felt the tears starting to run down his face. If that was what she wanted, he was going to respect that. Whether it tore him apart or not.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Reviews are welcome!


	7. Chapter Seven

Clarke wiped the tears from her eyes, her conversation ringing in her ears; the pained look on his face before she turned to leave. Maybe it was harsh to break off their friendship like that.

But he had to know that she was poison for him. He deserved so much better than her. She had only brought pain his life and it agonized her that he couldn’t see that.

“Are you okay?” she heard Emori ask. Clarke turned to see her standing a few feet away from her. Carrying a set of chopped wood.

Emori, who was going to be a lab rat for the Nightblood solution until she decided to inject the Nightblood herself. As Clarke saw it, that act was only part of being something that she wasn’t.

Besides, why was Emori looking concerned? Didn’t she call her out for selling out their friends.

“Yeah, never been better,” she retorted before continuing on her way. Feeling Emori’s gaze as she walked past her.

Honestly, why bother.

And it appears that one of the Eligius crew ramped up the volume of the speakers. At least Dani kept the music to that workshop of hers.

Speaking of Dani –

“We’re going to have to watch her back the moment Gellert gets out of isolation,” Shaw told her. After five rounds of the shock collar, McCreary had sentenced her to isolation for an week. If he thought it was an deterrent, Clarke begged to differ. That it might actually embolden her to ratchet up her provocative acts.

Though maybe Gellert’s problem wasn’t Dani McCreary’s existence. Maybe it was also the fact that McCreary wouldn’t allow his people free reign when it came to violence. Though maybe she might not be the only one.

It’s as if a portion of these people expected a “do whatever the hell we want” lifestyle after Diyoza, only to be given the message “just because Diyoza is no longer in charge, that doesn’t mean it’s a free for all.”

If Clarke could bet on it, she wouldn’t be surprised if Gellert gathered some of the anarchists to form a resistance of their own against him. Take him out and it wouldn’t bode well for her mother and Madi.

The last thing she needed was another riot like the one that put McCreary in power in the first place.

“It’s not just Dani I’m worried about,” Clarke pointed out. “She might have a bone to pick with the both of them.”

Clarke moved forward to be on her way. It was close to lunch and she made a promise to see her around that time. She was able to pinpoint her location before taking her to the makeshift eating canteen.

“What were you doing?” Madi asked her as Clarke moved the food around with her fork.

“Just some important stuff that you don’t have to worry about,” Clarke answered, trying to brush away the topic as she took a bite of her ham. Hoping that Madi wouldn’t ask about it any further.

“It must have been bad if you’re not telling me,” Madi muttered, not looking at her.

“Madi, everything I do is for our best interests,” Clarke maintained, even if Madi was smarter then that. Even if she will see through it.

“I hear that three more people crossed the border,” she pointed out. “Tell me that you didn’t help torture them.”

Clarke swallowed, feeling a golf ball in her throat. “That wasn’t them, Madi,” she explained, putting down her fork. “Gellert had knocked Dani unconscious this morning, and she could have done worse if she wanted to.”

“That doesn’t make it right, Clarke.” She winced as she saw Madi’s eyes well up with tears and the heartbreak in her face. “What happened to you, Clarke?” she asked before leaving her seat before limping away.

Clarke watched as she limped away before putting her face in her hands. _Way to go_ , _Clarke_ , she thought.

* * *

“What’s the face for?” Roan asked him as they retrieved their blankets and pillows for their beds in their lodging.

Bellamy swallowed, pondering whether to say it with so many people in here.

_Bellamy, I’d rather you let me go then assign a label that doesn’t apply to me._

The words were echoing in his head as well as the heartbreak that came along with it. It as was if he had lost someone close to him. And Clarke was close to him.

“Clarke…she wants to part ways,” Bellamy choked as Diyoza came to his other side. “That we’re better off not as friends.”

“What?” Diyoza asked, as if she couldn’t believe it. “Come again?”

“She thought I was better off without her,” Bellamy continued.

Nothing could be heard from Roan and Diyoza as he watched one of the new trio enter the church. For some reason, he did not have not the shock collar. And for that, Bellamy raised his eyebrow.

“From my memory, she was practically begging for your life in that derelict subway station six years ago,” Roan pointed out. “What could have made her think that she’s bad news to you?”

Two factors: one was some of his friends condemning her for her recent actions as well as a second more disturbing factor. McCreary was feeding her something that was making it worse. Though it seemed to border on being a toxic influence.

“People have been hard on her for what happened,” he pointed out. “Raven being the most vocal.”

“And it doesn’t help that she’s near Graveyard McCreary most of the time.” Diyoza carries her bundle. “Speaking of the devil, I have to shack with him for the time being. That’s what I get for being knocked up with his baby.”

Roan chuckles as she walks away. “I like her style,” he comments.

“Yeah, she’s edgy,” Bellamy comments. He wasn’t in the mood for this banter as all he could think about was his exchange with Clarke. He couldn’t just her go but he didn’t want to force her if she didn’t want to.

“What have we gotten ourselves into,” murmurs the boy, thumbing between the sheets and blankets. He turns to Bellamy, “Can you explain this dystopian nightmare?”

“Actually, it would be Post-Post Apocalyptic,” Bellamy corrected, knowing that it wasn’t long ago that Praimfaya devoured the Earth a second time. “The first time an A.I launched nuclear warheads as means of population control and the second time the remaining nuclear reactors scorched the entire planet save for this spot.”

It was then he saw recognition flash in the boy’s eyes. “Jaime’s soil samples say that there were two nuclear events,” the boy muttered before continuing louder, “The second one was a meltdown, it would have to make sense.”

“Bellamy Blake,” he introduced, offering his hand.

“Avery,” said his companion. Bellamy was going to ask for the lack of last name but decided against it. Maybe where he came from, last names had faded away into existence. Just like they had with the Grounders. Yet, he couldn’t speak with him long as could risk getting the round of the collar for holding up the line.

He was assigned in a cabin with Raven, Echo, Wells, Shaw and three of the Eligius inmates. Eight per cabin, they said. Aside from McCreary, the only exception to that rule was Abby Griffin. Maybe incase room runs out in the new medical center and she has to also treat patients in her dwelling.

“Did you hear that we’ll be joined by those from Eligius III?” Bellamy asked.

“Wait, what?” Raven asked as some of their roommates left the cabin. All of them saying about getting scalped if they didn’t work. Echo following them.

“Eligius III,” Shaw answered. “The Eligius Corporation kept mum about their objectives, saying that an group of scientists were going to examine the next asteroid field. Sometime before the mutiny, I was able to decrypt the files and actually it was a colonizing expedition. With the blood alterations that they also gave Eligius IV to survive the cosmic radiation, no one would need sunscreens with two suns. They never radioed back.”

An colonizing mission. It was something spoken about in the past, especially in the few decades before the bombs. As it was speculated that the Earth would not be able to sustain human life by the year 2078.

“And you encrypted the files as to not get caught by the captain,” Raven deduced, though she was smiling about it. “I’m sure these people are their ancestors. That they are coming back to check on the planet to see what became of it.”

Just like when she said the same thing about Eligius IV, Bellamy had the aching feeling that she was wrong.

* * *

“I see that you got yourself lucky, Murphy,” commented one of her boyfriend’s fellow enforcers – Watson, it was – as Emori propped her blankets and pillows on her bunk. Eight per cabin, though it didn’t help that at least half had to be populated by four former Eligius inmates.

John was able to get her, Harper, and Monty in this cabin. Perhaps the last two were smart not to join them right away, as these three gave Emori uncomfortable vibes; especially when they were reserving a bunk for one Tabitha Gellert, who seemed to be a anarchist of the violent variety. Who was currently in isolation for threatening Dani McCreary.

“Lay off, will you?” John retorted. Emori noticed that he didn’t say, “Go find some other chick to bother.” Not after what Ontari put him through in Polis six years ago.

Fortunately, the three left. The lecherous one saying on how he needed to fill his flogging quota. Emori’s stomach curdled in disgust. Even if John accepted McCreary’s assignment, he was surrounded by sadists on the daily.

“Are you okay?” he asked her.

He was probably talking about the fact that Watson objectified her earlier, though something else was bothering her. The image of Clarke appearing lost yet uncharacteristically flippant when asked if she was okay replayed through her mind, and it didn’t help that she didn’t seem herself the previous night when Eda, Mason, and Rory from Wonkru were flogged.

Yes, Clarke sided with McCreary, she sold out Shaw, Raven, and Echo, but Emori’s anger had faded since then.

_“Friends that she allowed to be tortured.”_

Emori swallowed. There was this ancient phrase _sticks and stones will break my bones but words will never hurt me_ which was known to be untrue. There was the unpleasant fact that maybe she and her friends were bringing Clarke down a wrong path.

“I am worried about Clarke,” Emori admitted.

John scoffed, which didn’t surprise her, but it disappointed her. “What’s there to worry about?” he retorted. “How I see it, there wasn’t much difference when she tried to have you burn you in that oven and when she flogged those three.”

“Do you have selective memory, John?” she demanded. “She could have allowed me to burn in that radiation chamber, but she didn’t. She injected herself with the Nightblood herself.”

“Come on, that was a façade,” John argued. “She only helps people when it suits her, like when she told McCreary about the Eye being down and Wonkru coming because she didn’t want to be on Wonkru’s side.”

“He wouldn’t be in power if you didn’t orchestrate that riot,” Emori pointed out. “McCreary had an agenda by coming back here and you played right into it, John.”

As he only used John to go back to this camp and come to power, then he was probably using Clarke to remain in power. As John was probably too stubborn to listen to it, Emori just left the room. She wasn’t going to argue with him on this, as the point seemed to be going over his head.

They accused Clarke of being a bad person and Emori was beginning to fear that maybe their words were creating the monster they said she was.

* * *

“Not the best I have seen but not too shabby either,” observed Josephine as she stood in the cabin; gazing around at the main room.

“We’re just starting from the ground up,” Clarke pointed out. Given the nature of Josephine’s comment, it had appeared that she was used to the finer things in life. Something she probably would have known given her immaculate way of dress. “And I’m pretty sure where you came from wasn’t all developed when your ancestors got there.”

“Chill out, okay?” Josephine frowned, as if Clarke’s response was an inconvenience. “Just a simple observation.”

Clarke shouldn’t have been surprised that Josephine was interested in scoping out the cabin before dinner. As if she had felt her curiosity was more important to sate before any food that she had to eat.

“Said like any decadent person whose never left their bubble for too long,” McCreary handed on before turning away from his notebook. Not hiding the fact that her comments were an nuisance as well. “Just be thankful that I did not decide to collar you and your friends. Now that’s discomfort.”

Josephine rubs the back of her neck as if by instinct. “Well, good thing then,” she mused, “because it would be bad if you did.”

The way Josephine said it, its as if she’d experience more then paralyzing pain. That it might be fatal. As McCreary was following her gaze to Josephine, perhaps she had shown some of her thoughts on her face.

Fifteen minutes later, Josephine sat across from them as they were eating dinner. Every now and then, Clarke was watching the door. Hoping to see Madi limp through, but taking today’s conversation, it was painfully obvious that she did not feel comfortable here.

“I find it strange that two of your friends have decided not to join us,” McCreary pointed out.

“Gabriel is most likely making sure that our friends have everything,” Josephine answers. “Same with Avery, though he’s probably hung up on his girlfriend.” She sighs. “I’m curious, how did you guys pull the rug from under the crew.”

Due to Josephine including her in there, it seemed that she thought that Clarke was one of the inmates aboard Eligius IV. Clarke could understand that, as she was never aware of what transpired almost an month ago. She wasn’t here when Wonkru and Eligius IV vied for control of the valley, only for the latter nearly wiping out the former.

At Josephine’s question, McCreary snorted. “I don’t think I’m the right person to ask that question to, as everything that happened was the brainchild of Diyoza. I merely made sure we had the numbers, as her group alone wouldn’t have stood an chance had it been just them.”

“Diyoza as in the terrorist Charmaine Diyoza of the United Liberation Army?” Josephine inquired. “She’s in our history books right next up to Bin Laden and Hitler.”

“You’re speaking to someone that has gone on hits for an mob in Queens,” McCreary pointed out. “We’re not known to have clean rap sheets around here.”

He wasn’t wrong there. Recently she had sold out the people she had thought were her friends simply because she thought she was protecting Madi when in actuality she was acting on her own selfish needs.

“I see.” Josephine picked at the fish on her plate. “And they said that the sting operation was messy business.”

Clarke wondered how much else she knew, as she seemed to be withholding information.

“Now…” he drifts off, indicating the change of subject, “…to ease some confusion in case it comes up, my wife was an chemist for the very same company that commissioned your little out of planet trip. In fact, she was invited to participate in that project and last I knew, she had no interest in it.”

“Oh, she did join as well as her son,” Josephine answered. “Sarah i-was one of the best people we had in Sanctum’s founding. One of the visionaries as well.”

Clarke nearly raises her eyebrow. Noticing the sudden correction that Josephine made due the change from present to past tense. And just by her face alone it was as if Josephine hoped that her gaff was overlooked.

Even if McCreary noticed, he wouldn’t have showed it. For he moved on with the subject. “Now, that you are here, I might as well go over basic rules. That is, if you desire your stay to be painless as possible.”

* * *

“So there is no man eating trees to worry about?” asked one of those that came in. Or Jaime Foster as she introduced herself.

“Man eating trees?” asked Wells, raising his eyebrow.

“One of the unpleasant realties in Sanctum,” said Avery, “which accompanies the Red Sun Eclipse psychosis.”

“That’s when the two suns eclipse each other,” brought up one Rachel Santiago just as Bellamy tried to digest what they meant by that. “According to Sanctum Lore, one of the founders went crazy and axed an portion of his peers.”

Most of Eligius III was congregated in the chapel, though Bellamy heard that two of them – referred to as Josephine and Gabriel – made residence in the gas station where Abby used to work. Bellamy never met them or took an good look at them but he supposed that they were the leaders of this operation. Of the six here, was an woman that appeared to be in her early thirties, slightly older then the rest here. Avery introduced her as Sarah, an relative of his.

And given the critical glances she gave the inside of the church, it was apparent that she was used to better. As if her clothes weren’t an indication enough.

As for what Rachel said about an Two Sun Eclipse, with that faraway gaze; how she shivered when she spoke about it, it was as if she was recounting something that happened to her personally then as if she was recounting an tale that was passed down to her.

“Is that why they never radioed back?” Shaw asked, as if recalling something he learned earlier. “Because of some massacre induced by an binary sun eclipse.”

The group gazed at each other as Bellamy observed Dani coming to the chapel with one of the new faces; maybe this was Gabriel. Bellamy had not missed that Sarah’s eyes were widening after she took one look at Dani. He could chalk it up as her being flabbergasted if it weren’t for the fact that it was as if she was seeing an ghost.

Huh?

“What we want to know,” started the one who introduced himself as Ryker Desai, “what happened here that would result in the collars around your neck.”

Raven opened her mouth –

“Sorry to rock the boat, but I hate to break it to you,” Dani said, glaring at Raven before turning to Murphy. “She and her friend here thought that it was more important to save their own asses and orchestrate an riot to escape rather then wait until things deescalated between us and an gladiator blood cult. And she likes to deny it.”

“That’s not true,” Raven shot.

“Are you going to deny that you caved and launched missiles at Wonkru because you did not want to see Shaw tortured?” Dani demanded.

“Wait.” Wells stands between them. “Let’s not start anything here.”

But Dani’s gaze had left Raven. Her eyes widened and Bellamy followed her gaze to Avery’s wrist. Her eyes focusing on that charm bracelet he was wearing around his wrist.

“Where did you get that?” she asked, the blood draining from her face. At this moment, Sarah was there near them.

“I…” he began, as he quickly took it off and put it in his pocket, and for some reason, he did not finish. As if he could not find what right words to use. As if he knew he wouldn’t lie his way out of this one.

A couple of their new companions went rigid. Especially Ryker, as perhaps they thought Dani was going to perhaps lunge at him.

“Ryker, it’s okay,” Sarah dictated. Her eyes not leaving Dani as she hovered by Avery. It was clearly evident that Sarah was restraining herself, but not the kind where she was preventing herself from jumping her. No, it was the kind where she was trying not to wrap her arms around Dani in an embrace.

Dani swallowed. Like she was determining her next course of action.

“Excuse me,” she rasps before leaving them.

As Wells stands to get up, Echo stops him. “It’s okay,” she assures. “I’ll take it from here.”

Echo follows Dani from the chapel as Avery heaves an sigh. Running his hand through his hair.

“Are you okay?” Gabriel asked him.

“It’s complicated,” was his answer. Even if Bellamy knew that there was an explanation why Dani had an interest in his bracelet. As if she had seen it before. Bellamy thought about asking what that was about, to maybe get better understanding of the situation until he decided against it.

Whatever it was, these people weren’t going to reveal it anytime soon. That whatever they were concealing was an powerful secret. As suggested by the fact that Sarah seemed to know who Dani was enough to recognize her, even if they never seemed to have met.

Which made the whole thing weirder.

“You bombed people?” Ryker asked Raven.

“Um…” Raven began uncomfortably.

“I’m sure we can discuss that later,” Gabriel suggested, filling Bellamy with relief. “Josephine had set up everything in the gas station.”

“What are you doing?” Wells asked. “Something related to your ancestor’s mission years ago?”

“The ancestors of the founders were due to return to Earth two hundred years after our departure,” Ryker explained. “To see if the Earth would give out as predicted or if we were wrong.”

Two hundred years. Where did Bellamy hear that before? “On the Ark, we were told that the Earth would be survivable after two centuries,” he explained. “Turns out, we were months away from it’s second end when we went down.”

“That’s what my soil samples said,” Jaime pointed out. “That there were two instances of radioactive destruction two centuries apart.”

Apparently, Monty, who was approaching the group with soil, seemed to be interested in what Jaime had to say. “You determined the Earth’s history with soil?” he asked. “That’s what they did before apocalypse one.”

Jaime nodded. “The Earth can tell many stories with it’s dirt without the voice of humans,” she divulged.

This conversation of science and data was more welcome then one of the carnage from nearly an month ago. Mainly as Dani seemed to air the fact that Raven felt forced to launch missiles at Wonkru in the gorge, reigniting some of that tension brewing beneath the surface ever since her dad took the valley.

Bellamy was surprised that an inferno did not envelope them.

* * *

_He has Bianca’s bracelet? Why? How?_

Those were the thoughts running through her mind after removing herself from the church to her workshop. Her young sister’s bracelet, something that her brother took possession of before her funeral.

Dani sighed as she set aside the radio transistor. Running her sweaty hands through her hair. There were two possibilities for his obtainment of the bracelet: either he was directly descended from her brother and it’s an heirloom or –

_No. That’s impossible_.

Even if it seemed impossible, that was the only other possibility. Danced around in the early 2010’s, scientists were talking about ways for the human consciousness to continue living even after the body has died. Digital immortality, they called it. And celebrities and politicians were lining up to be the first to have their minds uploaded to a computer chip.

Hell, it didn’t even help that he shared the same first name as her brother. She could dismiss it as passing down names if it weren’t for the way he looked at her when she noticed the bracelet. Like he always did if he thought something might land him in an sticky situation.

There was no other way to explain it.

Then there was the way that woman was restraining herself as she went to dissolve the situation before it got worse. Restraining herself as if trying to stop herself from wrapping her arms in an embrace. Looking at her like she was an ghost.

Someone knocks to the door and Dani turns from her project to see Echo stepping in. “Anything alright in here?” she asked.

“Just fixing this darn radio.” Dani turns back to her project. She wasn’t willing to discuss something as convoluted and complicated as this. Not when it’s personal.

Apparently, her words were an invitation. As Echo had went inside the old van regardless. “That doesn’t sound like you’re okay, not with what happened at the church recently.” She pulls up an chair and sits next to her. “What’s special about our new friend’s bracelet if you had never seen it before?”

Dani blew air into her cheeks. Might as well tell her, as she might find out anyway. “Thing is, I have seen it before.” Dani returns to the disassembled radio in front of her. “It was my sister’s.”

“I take it that she wasn’t among your lot,” Echo figured.

“Obviously no.” Dani swallowed, having an hard time to prevent the tears coming through. “She died when she was just fifteen. Bone cancer.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Share your thoughts! Reviews are welcome.


	8. Chapter Eight

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning for refences to physical abuse.

_I wonder…_

Originally, his mind was preoccupied on whether the Doc’s boyfriend would be still useful to them or not, as Paxton danced around the idea of putting metal in his head. However, this seemed to take his attention instead.

What are the odds of someone having the same name as his long dead niece as well as sharing her mannerisms? He never saw his wife’s sister and her family too often, but enough to still remember that the hair twirling was a tic that his niece displayed from time to time.

Even if she tried hiding it, Josephine wasn’t good at it. Too bad he was aware of the fact that scientists were talking about seeing to it that the human mind lives when the body has died around the time of that damn sting operation. Did she think that he could be played for an chump?

As she nearly used Sarah’s name in the present tense before correcting to the past tense, maybe she also decided to upload her mind on an computer drive as well. Which was odd as she didn’t seem the type.

Josephine and one of her friends took up residence in the Doc’s old workstation while the rest of them were at that church. He’d rather get this over with then wait until tomorrow. Not to mention that the cat was going to come out of the bag anyway.

“Stay here,” he instructs two of his guards before opening the door. Not bothering to knock. What was the point of knocking if this was his land?

Instrumental music – specifically the genre played by those showing off their intellectuality – was playing in the background as he stepped further. Josephine moving away from what he recognized as an easel, turning attention to an notebook lying on an table.

Not suspicious at all.

“I see that you have got yourself settled,’ he noted as he stepped forward. “Where’s your boyfriend?”

“With the other team members,” she answered. “I’ll join him shortly.”

“Mmmhmm,” he mutters under his breath before moving towards the easel. Removing the board to see a nearly finished portrait. One that resembled the likeness of his niece last time he saw her. Not ignoring that he got her attention, there was no point in beating around the bush. “I’m not an idiot, Josie. You’d don’t think I still remember that big shots were lining up in droves trying to get their minds uploaded in a computer chip, hoping to outlive their bodies?”

She had let out an irritated sigh, as if she knew she had fumbled in her attempts to conceal her secret. “What else did I do to give myself away, Uncle Pax?” she sighed.

“Aside from your tics and mannerisms?” he asks. “You were too relaxed compared to your friends. Now, who else decided to upload their minds in an computer chip aside from you and the possibility of your aunt?”

Kane should be lucky that he had least an few more hours to live.

* * *

Before the sun had set, Madi had returned to the cabin after dinner; followed closely by Diyoza. Clarke swallowed as Madi limped into the next room without looking at her. Wiping her eyes with the bottom of her palm as the tears started coming. Turning her gaze to the notebook still lying on the table, Clarke had hoped that the contents would be an distraction.

“Ironic,” Diyoza mused. “Graveyard hates my guts and he used my battle plans to get what he wanted.”

“Maybe because of the strategy that was involved,” Clarke pointed out. “That it guaranteed success even if it was by someone who he hated.”

Clarke hoped that Diyoza would go into the next room and leave her alone to her thoughts. Instead, she could hear an chair being pulled up.

“We never really got an chance to have an proper conversation,” Diyoza admitted, “aside from my interrogation of you and what we were going to do with Octavia.”

“As you said, we got off the wrong foot,” Clarke said, remembering what Diyoza told her moments after capturing her. Turning the page, she noticed diagrams and codes for an launch sequence accompanied by what Clarke recognized as an speech. “Too bad A.L.I.E beat you to destroying the world.”

With her record, Diyoza most likely killed more then she did. Though that did not mean she wasn’t overrun with the amount of lives drenching her hands.

The door creaked open and Clarke turned to see one of the guards enter the cabin. “Graveyard wants the both of you at the gas station,” he said. “Did not say why.”

Whatever it was, it was as there was something about it that he wanted to keep under wraps. Most likely relating to today’s development.

“Well, let’s see what he wants then,” said Diyoza, the cynicism heavy in her voice. As if it was in her blood to expect the worst. They both left the table and walked past the guard. Clarke not missing that Madi was looking out of the window after them.

Around them, were people getting settled into their assigned cabins. Lugging in crates. The post dinner commute around them, though she had seen an couple of the inmates getting into some kind of brawl. Their friends egging them on.

Two of McCreary’s bodyguards were standing outside the gas station as they arrived. Not leaving their post until he had left.

“…and leaving meant that you’d lose that paycheck and benefits,” McCreary spat out resentfully. “Not caring if our daughter was going to get poisoned by that shit they had us mine.”

“I petitioned that you’d be protected,” a woman had countered, almost as if she was pleading. “That you’d be given respirator masks.”

“And they were no good, were they?” he demanded. “We still managed to inhale the stuff. Of course, an top notch chemist with an mob hit man for an husband was bound to cause an fuss, so you fled the planet with our son, leaving me and our daughter to die mining some toxic shit, because appearances were too important then anything.”

Stepping foot into the gas station, Clarke could see an blonde woman standing an few feet from McCreary. Like with Josephine, there was a regal flair to how she was holding herself.

Even if there was an bright red mark on her left cheek, which suggested that she was just slapped in the face.

In the corner were Dani and Avery. Both of whom standing awkwardly around each other. As if they don’t know how to process the situation.

The blonde woman glares at her and Diyoza. As if their presence was an nuisance. Almost as if they were beneath her. “Don’t you see that we are having a discussion?” she demanded

“It’s alright, Sarah,” he said, not looking at her. “I had sent them.”

There was only one other Sarah that McCreary was referring to before: his wife, who was an chemist for the Eligius Corporation. Made known to her by Dani beforehand. One who Josephine nearly spoke in the present tense before correcting herself.

“As strange as it may seem, I would like to introduce you two the rest of my family.” He places his hand Sarah’s shoulder. “This is my wife, Sarah. Sarah, this is Clarke, my partner in this whole shindig, and Charmaine Diyoza, mother of my child.”

“Wife?” Diyoza asked, raising her eyebrow. “What kind of _Altered Carbon_ shit is this?”

“My brother-in-law went mad when the two suns eclipsed each other,” Sarah answered. “Put an ax to my head as I went to protect my son. Then, I woke up. Only, I did not recognize myself in the mirror.”

“Rather than facing the fact that people die,” McCreary coldly dismissed. “And it seems that one more body wasn’t enough. You had to keep regenerating.”

She thought she saw Avery hang his head in guilt. As if there was something about it that had bothered him for years.

“Russell was afraid that the next generations won’t remember what we knew,” Sarah justified.

“The average human lives seventy to eighty years,” McCreary states. “I’m guessing that this is your fourth –”

“Seventh in line,” Sarah interrupts before turning her gaze towards Diyoza, and all it took was one look at Diyoza’s expanding stomach that she narrowed her eyes and crossing her arms. “Seems like they should have issued IUDs to some of the inmates aboard Eligius IV. Out of all the women on board, he chooses the domestic terrorist.”

“And you’re standing next to a man that slaughtered a majority of a society for this valley,” Diyoza shot back.

“A cannibalistic blood cult to be exact,” McCreary responded, as if to counter her before turning to his wife. “Speaking of cults, whatever you got going on that _moon_ of yours screams it, from what little Josie gave me. Almost as if you were taking this far beyond digital immortality.”

Sarah swallowed hard. Almost as if she had begged to differ, and if Clarke could put a finger on it, was maybe insulted as well. As if he was desecrating something with his mere words.

He turns to Dani and Avery. “Now, you two tell people that there was a misunderstanding between you two. That it’s resolved, because what I just learned does not leave this building,” he ordered. “I can’t risk a third child of mine to have a target on their back, even if they put that computer chip of theirs in another body.”

The two…siblings exchanged glances before stepping forward. Avery pausing when McCreary holds out his palm. Clarke not understanding until Avery reaches into his pocket and drops an what looks like an charm bracelet. He swallows before averting his eyes, as if he’s worried about looking at him for too long.

“Hey, lighten up.” He places an hand on his shoulder. “No need to be tense around me.”

Avery nods and manages an meager smile before leaving the building. With Dani not too far behind him. Leaving the four of them in here together.

“Now, I wish I can chat some more, Sarah and catch up, but I have got more important obligations,” he says, making it clear that he does not look forward to it. He motions for Diyoza to leave first and when she does, Clarke could feel his hand on her rear. “Let’s go, shall we?”

Clarke could feel Sarah’s burning gaze as they leave the building. Though that anger seemed to be mixed with anguish.

* * *

“Can you please turn that shit down?” Raven called from the second room as Wells and Bellamy entered the cabin. Not taking Bellamy to know what was the source of Raven’s agitation. Rock music blasting as Gemma Braxton jammed to it while unboxing three of the crates in the cabin (“All the world I’ve seen before me passing by!”)

“Well then, that’s your problem,” Braxton retorted. “You got to liven up, Princess. Stop with all this pretentious shit.”

Raven mutters something under her breath before Dani strolls into the cabin. “How did it go?” Wells asked her. After tracking her to her workshop and talking with her, Echo said that Dani was soon summoned to the gas station. For her dad wanted to speak with her. He, like everyone else, had assumed that McCreary heard about the incident in the church involving the bracelet that Avery was wearing around his wrist.

“Turns out it was some misunderstanding,” Dani answered. “It wasn’t Bianca’s bracelet. Turns out it was his great-grandmother’s. That the style wasn’t too unique.”

“And how did your dad react to it?” asked Bellamy, knowing that McCreary probably did not like his time being wasted. That his reaction would be volatile.

“He pocketed it,” Dani answers. “Said that it was best so it wouldn’t cause problems again.”

_Maybe in case it becomes an weapon_ , Bellamy thinks to himself. As it would make more sense. Tyrants weren’t known to take chances, especially given the fact that he disarmed most of his men save for an few after decimating most of Wonkru.

“Better then pulling out one of his teeth, I should say,” Shaw acknowledged as Dani turned to help Gemma with her tasks.

“Since they won’t turn down the music in here, I might as well as this as an opportunity to be with some of our friends in the church.” Raven picks up her bag. “Make sure that nothing happens to them.”

Probably had to do with Dani in the cabin then the music.

“Might as well go myself,” Shaw mutters. “Make sure that she is not alone. See you guys in the morning.”

Once Shaw leaves, Wells agonized, “Can’t you and Raven try to get along? I mean, I’m sure the two of could figure out some kickass stuff together.”

“Not going to happen any time soon with this high and mighty shtick she’s doing,” Dani sighed.

It was sad that Raven did not trust her. Even as she proved time and time again (half based on what Wells told him) that she would help them, not throw them under the bus. That she would be one of the things instrumental things to take down her dad.

Speaking of McCreary –

It was one of the things that he agonized as he slept. Yes, Echo could still try to infiltrate his inner circle but try everything else, it would implicate their new friends. That McCreary would blame them. That he’d take it out on them.

_What could Clarke do?_ He thinks. Oh, Clarke. He wished that they had her brains with them.

“Don’t forget this too,” she said six years ago, before they separated. When she touched his temple. If they were going to go without Clarke, he was going to have to look at things at how she would have.

And in fact, she too would agree that they couldn’t act out right away. More so, it would have been her idea as well.

Which means that they would have put their plans on hold for sometime. Maybe even for an few months until it’s safe to resume tact. And by that time, their new friends would not be in grievous danger. They won’t get the brunt of it if they were to fail.

_Come on, taking him down is dangerous to begin with_ , one part of his mind scolded.

_Yes, but he’ll correlate it with these new people coming down_ , argued the rational part of his mind. He would think it was all them. That they’ll be placed in serious jeopardy if he were to continue with their plans.

People’s safety should come first in things like this before they could enact anything.

Though necessary, that idea that still bothered him as he dragged his feet to breakfast at the sound of the siren. Rubbing his eyes as he approached the table where his friends sat, and he could see that some of the new people from yesterday.

Emori and Murphy were sitting a few feet apart from each other. Not looking at each other. Bellamy wondered what happened this time. 

“…and getting it back is out of the question,” Avery said as Bellamy took an seat with his meal.

“And judging by the looks of him,” Jaime continued before saying, “I wonder what we got ourselves into.”

“An dystopian hellhole,” Miller said in an whisper as they were joined by Gabriel and an girl with dark brown hair. “Honestly, you’re glad that one of you wasn’t jumped and forced to walk around here.”

“And that we’re not collared.” She sits across from them. “I’m Josephine, but my friends call me Josie.”

“Josephine as in that song from Titanic?” Murphy asks.

“No.” She shakes her head. “That movie sucked by the way. Who hooks up with an boy you only knew for four days?”

“Someone is talking,” Gabriel said, as if something about her comment amused him.

Josephine just shrugs.

“If there’s anything you can get done, we can help you,” offered Monty. “I mean, as long as we work, I don’t think he’ll care.”

“Yes, that is if you understand half of it,” said Josephine. Condescendingly as if they were speaking in an different language from her.

“Our goal was to merely see what happened to the Earth,” said Gabriel. “See if there is any change in vegetation, how long we can survive, etc.”

“Well, this is the only survivable piece of land, so…” Murphy started.

“From the size of this place, it seems it can fit a lot more then it’s current number,” said Avery.

Even if Wonkru wasn’t such an gladiator cult, Bellamy doubted that the inmates would have even wanted to share the valley anyway. McCreary already seemed to have it in his mind that since they landed here, it was theirs.

“Now, we can help you out if you like,” Bellamy offered. “If you don’t seem to mind.”

Josephine frowned, almost as if it was out of the question. “Thanks for offering, but I think we got it covered.”

“I don’t see the harm if they pitch in,” Gabriel countered. “It’s not like we’re hiding anything.”

“It’s just that…” she drifts off. “It would confuse them.”

“Sounds simple enough by how you described it,” Wells pointed out.

* * *

“I could concoct you some more medicine, if you like,” Clarke could hear Sarah offer as she entered her mom’s workshop. Clarke could remember Sarah’s infernal gaze from the night before, though she remembered an slight irritation and disappointment before then. As if her reunion with her husband did not go as planned.

“Sarah’s always been one to worry about what other people would think,” he said to her. “It was always about appearances. I shouldn’t been even surprised that she changed her mind and decided to take our son with her on that company field trip, just so she would not be seen as the wife of an contract killer and mom of an hacker. But what surprises me is that she is in a cult revolving around living forever. A cult that is probably facing extinction at the rate they are going with their bodies, given that she said it was her seventh body.”

Clarke could remember the resentment when McCreary now spoke of his wife. As if she thought that appearances and her job meant more to her. Heck, she could even taste it. Maybe she shouldn’t blame him.

She knocks on the doorjamb, and the two women turn to her. “I’m going to make sure that our visitors have everything they need,” Clarke reminded her mom. “So, if you need anything, radio me.”

“I’m sure she should have everything she needs,” said Sarah, and Clarke could see an trace of resentment in her navy blue eyes. Most likely still livid that her husband touched her rear in front of her. Maybe that was on purpose, as McCreary would definitely be handsy with another woman in front of his own wife just to stir up anger.

On the one hand, it was awkward to be around her as Clarke was literally screwing with her husband.

“That’s alright,” said her mom, glaring at Sarah before turning to her. “Thank you, Clarke. Sarah had volunteered to help as well.”

With what limited information she received, Clarke had the idea that Sarah was limited to determine the combinations for fuel. Though, perhaps she learned how to determine the combinations for medicine and other things.

“Now…” Sarah approached her. “I suppose perhaps there is something that Paxton would want me to know.”

Clarke could tell that she prevented herself from saying _my husband_. Though, it wouldn’t make sense to refer to her own husband by their last name. Even if her familiarity with the name slightly gave it away.

Sarah touches her shoulder and steers her out the door. Literally grabbing her by the wrists as they were outside. Steering her towards an copse of trees.

“Hmm, I could see why he’d develop an interest in you,” she hissed, throwing her against an trunk. Sizing her up before dismissing her. “You’re not too bad on the eyes. Now, don’t get any ideas from those romps of yours.”

Beneath that resentment, it was like there was an semblance of hurt. As if she was taking away more from her then physical connection.

“Don’t worry, there’s nothing between me and your husband,” said Clarke. “Besides, if you hadn’t chosen to stay with the company that enslaved him and your daughter, he wouldn’t be resenting you right now.”

“It’s fortunate that you’re protected here,” Sarah seethed. “For if this was Sanctum, you wouldn’t be so lucky.”

She lets go of her and Clarke watches as she walks towards the center part of the original village. Due to the threat in her words, Clarke could tell that she was serious. Maybe she could relay this encounter to McCreary, as he would see this as a threat to his dominance here.

Where his wife came from, it seemed she was used to people deferring to her. Perhaps her need for power is what made her similar with her husband. 

* * *

“What do you mean it’s on hold?” Raven demanded when she had caught him alone after breakfast. Raven had lured him away under the pretense on needing help for some project. And there was one obvious reason why she would.

“Look,” he whispered. “They just came here yesterday. If we proceed now, he’s going to think they emboldened us. It’s too dangerous.”

Raven scoffed. “It’s going to be dangerous either way, Bellamy,” she said, as if he was being ridiculous. “Echo is going to do her thing, and we’ll see how to proceed from there.”

In fact, he had updated Echo about his plans in Trig. She didn’t seem to object, as her main goal was to gain McCreary’s trust and infiltrate his inner circle, and she felt that acting out her plans right away would be too risky right now.

“Echo agrees that it would be too risky her to act on it right away,” Bellamy points out. “Begin right away after she reaches her goal, it’s going to be dangerous. In fact, he’s probably counting on it.”

“So, we’re going to let it go on until it’s impossible,” Raven stresses.

“What would Clarke do?” he whispers.

Raven sighs, letting it slip that she was frustrated with him. “Why am I not surprised,” she sighs. “We shouldn’t have to wait for her nor do we have to waste our time thinking about how she would have done things. We need to think for ourselves, and how I see it, we have an window of opportunity and we be damned if we miss it.”

Even she had an point, he did not like how she was going with this. “That does not mean that we have to be rash with this, Raven,” he hissed.

“Whatever, Bellamy,” she sighed before walking away. Her arms crossed. As much as it bothered him that she didn’t seem to understand their new circumstances, it did not surprise him. Raven had an tendency of not seeing things in the viewpoints of other people. That perhaps they might have an better idea then she would.

How Raven saw it, only she was the one with the best brains of the group. Perhaps he swelled her ego too much.

He picks up an barrel. It was his day to help pick vegetables in the western quadrant. Beside him, he could see Gabriel beside him. Carrying an barrel as well. With him, was the girl he called his sister, Rachel.

“Shouldn’t you be looking at plant samples?” Bellamy asked him.

“Well, if some of you offered to help us, then we should help you,” Gabriel answered. “It wouldn’t be fair we didn’t return the favor.”

“Where’s your girlfriend?” asked Roan.

“Somewhere just being uppity,” Rachel answered. “She’s overseeing Jaime with her analyzing and comparing soil samples. Then again, she should pitch in and help too.”

Even if she was trying to sound casual, there was some resentment buried underneath. Almost as if she did not like Josephine for some reason. He didn’t see too much of them last night to read their dynamic but that was too early to tell.

“How bad was it?” Gabriel asked. “When Josephine and I checked in on the others in the church last night, there was some discussion on how there was conflict here.”

“In that case, you’re lucky to have landed now and not then,” Roan retorted.

“That bad, huh?” wagered Gabriel.

Bellamy, with some help from Roan, explained everything that happened in the bunker and the valley that led up to the bloodbath in the gorge.

“I supported her from the beginning,” Roan said at one point. “I even stood by her after Kara’s failed coup. Imagine my horror when I saw her morph into the monstrosity that we knew as _Blodreina_.”

“I tried to stop her,” Bellamy divulged later, plucking an tomato from an bush. “My friends and I did everything that we could think of, but in the end she still led an army to their deaths. I should have done more.”

Though actually he should have been there for Clarke before their friends started tearing into her. Maybe she wouldn’t be falling under McCreary’s influence if he had. Then she wouldn’t have felt that she was bad for him.

Gabriel puts an hand on his shoulder. “There are days where I regret making certain decisions,” he emphasizes. “There are nights where I can’t sleep without thinking about it.”

Bellamy wondered what it was that Gabriel regretted. It had to be bad given the heavy regret in his tone. Must be as Rachel was touching her brother’s shoulder as if in comfort.

From his periphery, Madi hobbled near them. Carrying an straw basket and began plucking out tomatoes. Just like Raven, she couldn’t walk unless with assistance from an brace. Guilt washed all over him again at the thought of her fall.

Oh, how Bellamy desired to end McCreary, as most likely her fall was orchestrated.

“You need help with that?” Roan asked Madi.

“I got it,” she said, plucking the next tomato.

He wanted to ask how Clarke was but decided against it. Now was not the time. Maybe sometime later.

“They are letting you work?” Rachel asked, looking at the brace at Madi’s leg. The outrage in her eyes about an disabled child being allowed to travel to pick vegetables. Deep down, Bellamy wished that she did not make the trek by herself.

But Raven was able to travel some ways with an brace.

“I have to work,” Madi said. “I’m considered able with an brace.”

“Were you in an accident?” asked Gabriel.

“I lost my step when I climbed an building to get some guys water,” Madi answered. “I didn’t wake up until two days ago.”

Just by her tone, Bellamy knew she wasn’t telling the truth. Almost as if she was afraid what might happen if she did. Like she was afraid what an danger it would pose on Clarke. To top it off, Madi seemed dejected when she woke up from his observation. Like she sensed something was wrong.

“After we’re done here, I’ll carry your basket and give you an piggyback ride back,” he offered. Hoping to not give her strain on her leg.

* * *

“Some of the greens that yesterdays’ team picked yesterday,” Clarke divulged as she set down the crate on the table. “Something for you to start with.”

Clarke watched as Jaime rifled through the contents. Her eyes beaming with interest as she took out an ball of cabbage. “Now, let’s see how the cabbage differs from the ones in Sanctum,” she says.

“Well, since you are kind to offer Earth’s fauna for us to analyze, perhaps you could try one of Sanctum’s unique fruits,” Josephine offered, coming towards her line of sight. Hands outstretched and Clarke noticed an cluster of what looked like pink berries.

“Um, Josie, I’m sure she has work to do,” Avery brought up. “There’s probably something he wants her to do right now.”

Yeah, like overseeing the enforcers at northeastern quadrant. Making sure they were acting in line and promising action if they acted otherwise.

“I’m not sure he’d mind,” Josephine stated. “It’s not going to take long.”

Figuring that Josephine was going to coax her either way, Clarke’s hand shakes with uncertainty as she picks one of them up. Watching Avery’s and Jaime’s curious glances as she pops it in her mouth.

It’s sweet. Too sweet. Like she had just put sugar in her mouth. In reflex, Clarke spits it out.

“Yeah, it’s not everyone’s favorite,” Josephine said, shaking her head. “Well, I wasn’t one to like cotton candy.”

Cotton candy. Clarke only heard about it, but if it was what it tasted like, she wouldn’t like it either.

“Also, I might have lent you some of my clothes,” Josephine continues, opening her notebook. “A Ferrari like you shouldn’t go walking around like they found clothes in an garbage heap.”

She was most likely referring to her jacket, leathers, and boots. And this comment made her like Josephine less and less. “Sorry, but we don’t have the options you do back on your planet,” Clarke icily shot back.

It was like Avery was trying hard not to laugh.

Josephine clicked her tongue against the roof of her mouth. “Judgy, aren’t we?” she said.

The door bursts open and as he steps in the room, Avery and Jaime tried to look as if they were working. McCreary’s eyes sweep past Clarke and instantly lock with Josephine. “Now, the two of us need to talk,” he spat. “Alone.”

She did not miss the irritation in his voice. As if it were one of those things that aggravated him during the day. What else was not new?

“Can it wait?” Josephine asked, rolling her eyes. “We got some important things to do.”

At that, his eyes hardened. The look he gave when he felt like someone was challenging him. Josephine winced, her eyes widened in surprise. Almost as if she did not expect this for some reason.

“Now, you really want to make this difficult for yourself, Josie?” McCreary demanded, advancing towards her before grabbing her by the upper arm.

“Hey!” Jaime shouts. “What do you think –”

“Jay.” Avery holds back Jaime. “Stop. It’s not going to make things better.”

Out the window, Clarke could see Josephine struggling against her uncle’s hold. The same time as an working unit containing Bellamy arrived back. Gabriel moved towards them, but Clarke watched as Bellamy – with Madi on his back – restrained him. Watching as Bellamy said something to him.

Watching as Bellamy tried to restrain Gabriel from advancing at McCreary, it was confirmation that Bellamy was too good for an toxic person like her.

“I’m going to check on her,” Clarke said, looking at the worry on their faces.

Well, she could care less about Josephine. She was more interested in seeing what that was about. But she still felt like she needed to give these people an assurance. They don’t need to know what kind of person was yet.

Given the direction he was taking her, it had to be the hovercraft. She left the gas station and made sure that she was several steps behind so he would not notice. From her periphery, she watched as Murphy and another enforcer who they called Nikki Bang Bang break up an altercation between two Eligius inmates.

In the hovercraft, she noticed some guards leaving the bridge and though the door had shut, she could still hear some bits of an conversation.

“So that’s what you use those trees for?” she could hear him demand. “For some ridiculous cult practice?”

“We also use them to purify the bloodline,” she says. There is an beat. “People are born less and less with the blood. Just consider it an means to keep the population contained.”

“The more I learn about that moon of yours, the more it sounds like an cult,” he spits out. “Just as bizarre as that blood cult that I should have left for dead in that bunker.”

“Please, we’re not like that, Uncle Pax,” said Josephine in annoyance.

“You could have fooled me,” he scoffed.

Josephine doesn’t say anything, but Clarke would not be surprised if she rolled her eyes.

“Look, I’ll allow to test one of them out and see what happens before planting them outside around the valley,” he said. “On the other hand, keep the rest of that Sanctum shit out of my valley.”

Even if she did not catch the first part, whatever it was, he grudgingly accepted. Seems like two hundred years could change an familial relationship. Even if they probably weren’t close in the first place.

* * *

“This is an cool workshop you got here,” Ryker noted as he and Jasmine took in the ancient van.

Raven snorted. “No, say that to Dani,” she corrected, turning to fix the headset charger. “She’s the one that owns the place.”

“Seems like you two have an kind of beef with each other,” Ryker noted. “Care to explain what is that about?”

Raven chuckled. “Why?” she pointed out. “She’s just an pretentious asshole who likes to beat an dead horse.”

She had some responsibility, she got that. But she did not need Dani Flipping McCreary to keep hammering away at it. Sounds like her dad when it comes to not letting things go. Like father like daughter.

Jasmine picks up an screwdriver and moves towards her. Sensing her attentions, Raven raised her hands to stop her. “No,” she said. “He’s going to find out that it got taken out.”

“What’s he going to do if you do take that off?” Jasmine asked.

Raven winced, remembering what that bastard said about the punishment for attempting to take off the shock collars. “ _Try taking that off or you’ll wind up with burned hands_ ,” were his words weeks ago.

“If we do, he’ll burn our hands,” Raven answered. To be honest, it was like he was hoping she’d try so he could find an excuse to burn her hands. McCreary was not satisfied unless he had someone screaming in pain.

She never understood why Bellamy would want to stall bringing that son of an bitch down. Wait too long and by then, he have his hold on the camp. Just like when Bellamy decided to destroy that hydrogenator and came back with more people six years ago.

Yes, caring for people was an part of what Bellamy was. But still.

Jasmine hesitated before setting down the screwdriver. “It’s cruel, that they do that to you,” she said.

“He doesn’t get his jollies unless he has someone screaming in agony,” she said.

Ryker mutters something under his breath. “Where we come from, it’s not perfect, but not like this,” he says.

Raven could sense an desire to help in his voice. Giving her some hope of finding an ally in this. That he might help them.


	9. Chapter Nine

“Josephine!”

Bellamy turned away from his work when he saw Gabriel running towards his girlfriend. It was an few minutes ago when they watched McCreary drag Josephine through the main village. And even with Madi on his back, Bellamy had to stop Gabriel from doing anything stupid.

Bellamy did not want to think what McCreary wanted with her.

There was slight annoyance on Josephine’s face as Gabriel assessed her. Though she didn’t push him away when he hugged her. And just seeing them hug made something stir in him. An sense of longing, remembering when Clarke clung to him after they reunited six years later.

Bellamy closed his eyes and shook away the memory, which was like an knife digging into his heart. He turned away from them and continued on what was in front of him.

“It’s not like you’re going to rob an bank anymore,” he could hear Diyoza scoff from one end of the sorting table.

“At least I’m not carrying all that extra weight around,” said the blonde inmate that Diyoza was talking to. Still counting her bullets, and loading them in her gun with her black gloved hand. “Sore backs, morning sickness, the whole works.”

Nikki, or Nikki Bang Bang according to Murphy. Was once an bank robber and spree killer. With her rap sheet and the fact that she makes an habit of counting her bullets, it’s no surprise that she is from McCreary’s faction.

Counting bullets must be a way to compensate for not killing people. An intimidation tactic.

“As if you’re the maternal type.”

“My sister punched out two kids, so I heard about it.” Bellamy winces as he hears her load the chamber into her pistol. And she curls her lips in an smirk when she notices him looking at her. As if she was glad that he had caught her attention.

“What did you do to ruffle Graveyard’s feathers?” someone called out. “You’re lucky to have made it out alive.”

It looked as if Josephine wanted to say something until Gabriel gave her an look. Josephine presses her lips together in annoyance before shrugging.

Thing is, what did she do? Maybe it was an question to be answered when they weren’t around these goons.

“Well, while we were making comparative notes on plant genomes, you and Rachel seemed to have different priorities,” Josephine iterated.

“Wouldn’t hurt to do your share of the work,” Rachel said. “It’s fair if they want to help us out.”

“You never fail to be cute, you know that?” she said, and Rachel grimaced. Dani approached the table and Bellamy watched as she went over to Nikki. Whispering something in her ear.

Judging by Dani’s grimace, it probably was not good.

“Alright then.” Nikki stands up. “Just don’t be too lenient with them, alright.”

Whatever, Dani mouthed as Nikki left. The latter blowing with her fingers to gather her friends. Dani takes Nikki’s old seat, and looks at Josephine. “If you’re not going to sort the vegetables, leave,” she said, picking up an tomato from an pile. “Dad doesn’t like it when people just stand around workstations.”

Josephine sighs and pulls up an chair. Muttering how she’s going to get back to her work after this. As if she would do anything then sort vegetables.

“What does your dad want with Nikki?” she’s asked.

“Answer that question and he’ll give me an earful,” she said. “Can’t talk about it. Top secret.”

Though that did not mean that she’ll talk about it with someone later. Maybe Wells sometime, when no one is around of course. Though given Josephine’s poker face, it was like she had an idea what it was, and Bellamy thought that it was unsettling.

It also gave him the idea that whatever it was, was bad.

Across the table, he thought he could hear Diyoza grunt in pain.

“Whoa!” Dani exclaims. “Everything alright, Colonel?”

“Yeah,” she sighs, though her face was still riddled with pain. “Nothing to worry about.”

Bellamy remembered this all too well. His mother would have these false labor pains in the last four months of her pregnancy. “I think we should get you to see Abby,” he urged.

“Come on, it’s too early,” said her companion. “What is she, like six months?”

“Yeah, but one could still get the Braxton Hicks,” Dani pointed out, and as someone was going to move to the tent, Dani grabbed their arm. “And no, I wouldn’t. At least right now.”

Maybe Dani wanting to wait to tell her dad was an good call, as he would bound to make the situation stressful. McCreary would bound to have made an situation involving Braxton Hicks worse.

* * *

“First she goes from mixing up chemicals to being in a cult where people offer themselves, dead bodies, and sometimes babies to trees.” McCreary snorts, turning the water canteen that he just emptied. “And I thought that blood cult was enough.”

Upon checking up with him, apparently Sarah wanted to plant trees native to Sanctum out of the valley. Clarke wondered how they were going to go about that with the soil being irradiated but she had an feeling that they’ll find an way around it. With Sarah being an chemist.

As for giving babies to be eaten by trees –

“Makes what happened in the Bunker child’s play,” she iterated, picking apart her corned beef sandwich. One of the last of the rations from the Eligius IV. They were going to have to rely on what was in the valley. Not that she could complain.

“It’s just as jacked up as cannibalism or worse,” he says. “I wouldn’t be surprised if all these years affected her sanity. I’m surprised that your mom’s boyfriend isn’t insane from that cult he was in. Speaking of Kane, we need to talk about him.”

Clarke swallowed. She had an feeling that this would come up.

“Your mother’s boyfriend seems to outlive his usefulness,” McCreary continued. “There is nothing else I can think of him for him to do.”

It seemed that he had been wanting to find a opportunity to kill Kane. She blinked a tear away, reminded of Madi’s condemnation of her actions and the fact that if Kane dies, it would break her mother.

“Well, who are you going to hold over my mom’s head if you kill him?” Clarke asked, not looking at him as she stood from her chair. Trying not to let it slip that killing Kane was not a option.

“Is he insurance? Yes,” he answers as she could feel his footsteps towards her. “But even those that are insurance has to be of some use, and he’s outlived it. Besides, I can find other ways to keep your mother in line. Also, eight people came yesterday. Might as well make more room.”

Other ways. Even if Clarke couldn’t think of what else, it seems that McCreary could always think of something.

“No, Kane is not going to be an strain on our resources,” she forcefully put. Hoping to see her point and back off. After all, she was his strategist. That’s why he has her by his side.

“You know, something about your hesitation bothers me.” He grabs her shoulders and forces her around. “Tell me, who said what to bring this on.”

Clarke swallowed, pondering what to tell him. Though he’d find out anyway. “Madi is disappointed in me,” she admits. “That I have become a stranger to her.”

He snorts, like it was the most amusing thing he had heard. “You know how kids are,” he says. “They don’t understand the same things that we do. Don’t know how hard it is to be an adult.”

“She doesn’t like what is being done,” she stressed.

“Well, she’ll just have to get over it,” he spits out. “Things aren’t the same for her as they were when you two had this valley for yourselves. Besides, wasn’t he the one who pushed for your dad to get executed and your incarceration. You told me yourself last night.”

Clarke swallowed, blood draining at the fact that she let it out last night after sex. She never meant to, but she did. That’s what she hated about sex: it makes you say things about yourself that you never want to share. “Yes, he did,” she iterated.

“And then he hooked up with your mom,” he said. “Seems too convenient, if you ask me.”

Kane was friends with her parents before her father was floated, and it wouldn’t have surprised her if he had a thing for her mom. To be honest, maybe it did seem too convenient. “You might have a point,” she conceded.

But there was her mother to think about. She loves him and if he dies…

_Why the foot dragging, Clarke?_ whispered a voice in the back of her head. _What he said, he pushed for your dad to be executed. What goes around, comes around_.

The door slides open and one of the inmates comes in.

“You know, you can knock,” McCreary spits out, letting them know that they walked in on what he deemed an important discussion.

“Sorry, sir,” the man coughed. “Colonel Diyoza was taken to see Doctor Griffin, and apparently –”

“No, you must not refer to her by that obsolete title of hers,” McCreary spits out, advancing towards him. “Refer to her as such again and I’ll have to remind you who’s in charge here, Jacobs. Now, what’s wrong with my child?”

“The doctor checked up on her and turns out it was an case of the Braxton Hicks,” he said.

“False labor,” McCreary said. “Hmm. Should have known. Well, I shouldn’t be surprised. My wife had two spells of them for Avery. Well, tell the Doc to keep me informed if anything else happens. Go.”

Jacobs leaves and McCreary mutters something under his breath before turning back to her. “Tonight, I want you to find Kane,” he says. “I’ll be waiting by that canopy in the outskirts of the original settlement.”

There was no way she was going to change his mind on that one. But, did Kane really deserve to live after he had her dad floated?

* * *

Avery drew in an deep breath as he approached that ancient van that he saw his sister enter from an few moments ago. Tapping the metal, it must be two centuries old. As old as he was.

But Avery would rather be dead then having his mind replace the one wiped from his Hosts over and over again. Maybe if they left him be dead after Uncle Russell buried that ax in his chest, he wouldn’t feel the murderous vibes from his own dad.

He should have expected it, as he seemed to become an complete stranger from the dad he knew after he was arrested, and it seems prison life hardened him. Different from the dad who would teach him and Dani how to do DIY projects in the garage of their Long Island home.

Death was preferable then knowing that your father was an monster. Though Avery had seen his mother transform into an monster before his eyes.

He could hear Imagine Dragon’s Believer blare out from the van as he stepped inside. “Not the same as an Harley, though,” he heard Ryker say. “But I never rode one, so what I am to say.”

Ryker Desai. During the twenty-one days they were in camp before the Red Sun Eclipse, he and Ryker had formed an friendship. Playing soccer with him while the adults did their thing. Avery still wanted to like Ryker, but him “paying tribute” to his Hosts so he would feel less guilty about what they were doing made it hard.

But what was he to criticize, as he did not tell Jaime the truth in fear of her hating him? Even if it was warranted, as they were murdering the Hosts.

Ryker and Jasmine, as well as the others in the van turned to him. Dani, who was speaking with the boy named Monty Green turned to gaze at him. She was biting her lip, as if she was wondering what to do.

“I’ll be right back, guys,” she says before tossing an remote to the side. “He probably needs some help on something.”

Eyes were on them as she guided him from the van. Dani took him through the gas station and towards that cluster of cabins. Not stopping until they reached one that was alone from the rest.

Maybe their dad’s cabin given the distance from the others.

“Figure we talk here as no one’s here at the moment.” Dani sits at one of the chairs. It was simple. With an table and an few chairs, with an double bed at the corner; halfway covered by an curtain, probably for privacy. There seemed to be another room to the side.

What caught his attention was an handmade wooden crib at the side of the main room. Reminding him of the fact that there was an baby on the other way.

“I mean, I know you’re my brother but in an way you’re not,” she says, throwing her hand in the air. “I mean, the whole thing is straight out of an sci-fi movie.”

Well, that part of her hadn’t changed. The use of her terminology and such.

He couldn’t blame her for being slightly weirded out by it. He be too, but that was nothing about the shame in his heart.

“Invasion of the Body Snatcher’s scifi,” he specified. Though Charmaine Diyoza likening it to Altered Carbon was accurate too. He swallows. “What makes it crazier was that it was supposed to be an one time thing. To resurrect the members of Team Alpha one time after that day, but that changed after Gabriel died from cancer.”

“Shit,” she mutters. “I know where this is going, and I hate it.”

“Uncle Russell knew no one would accept the truth, so he concocted the lie that the Host becomes one with the Prime.” Avery sighs. “That the Host hands over control and lies dormant until they die. Truth is, we have to wipe the mind of the Host as the brain won’t survive with two minds.”

Realization dawned on his sister’s eyes. “So, someone has to die so you could live,” she says. “I’ll be honest, but it’s messed up shit.”

He nods. “Dead man walking,” he says. “Uncle Russell, Aunt Simone, mom, they have come to believe the lie about themselves that they feed: that they are some type of god,” he answers. “Josie doesn’t see herself as an god. She just likes living forever.”

Dani chuckles. “Last time I knew, Uncle Russell was a staunch atheist who idolized Nietzsche. He wasn’t someone to lead a cult.”

Though what was going on here was hard to comprehend for him.

“So, mom’s gone off the deep end from what I hear,” she says.

* * *

Diyoza had returned from Abby’s med office half an hour later. And Bellamy found himself pleasantly surprised that McCreary didn’t check on the situation. Perhaps he did not think false labor was worth his time. That he had something else on his mind.

Though Bellamy hated to think what it was. As nothing good could go through his mind.

Anyone who has only spent an day here would be think that Dani McCreary had unsavory intentions when leading Avery away towards the cabins, given who her dad is. Bellamy wondered what that was about, but shelved it away in his head. That it was personal.

And he doubt that Avery would answer that.

“Do you think there’s something about our new friends that we don’t know about?” Monty asked as the two trooped off to the gas station. Monty having said something about wanting to help with their botany.

“Do you think there is something?” Bellamy asked Monty, thinking about what happened between Avery, Dani, and Sarah in the church last night.

“I don’t know but there’s something about them…I don’t know,” Monty answered. “Like they are hiding something.”

“Hiding something or not, there is something odd about them,” Harper concurred.

If Monty was concerned whether there was something odd about them, maybe he should too. Then again, Bellamy had too much on his plate these days.

He could hear the first segment of Vivaldi’s _Winter_ play from somewhere as he stepped in the gas station. Which was in stark contrast to the rock and heavy metal that the Eligius miners preferred. From his memory, the last faction that preferred classical music was Mount Weather. Not there was anything wrong with classical music but he could not shake that association from his head.

Jaime was writing down some notes as she looked at what appeared to be two samples. With Sarah and Josephine talking. Josephine turned to her notes while Sarah’s eyes locked to him. Her blue eyes freezing over.

“Don’t you have other things to do?” Sarah asked, with the irritation heavy in her tone. Though there was an eloquence to it, just the cadence of her tone reminded him too much of McCreary.

“Apparently, they offered to help with some of our work,” Josephine pitched in. Judging by her tone, it seemed that she was not pleased.

“Gabriel’s idea, I assume.” Sarah still gazed at him, Harper, and Monty. Her nose crinkled as if they were dung she found under her shoe. “What is it with him liking…common folk?”

“At least we’re not like some of the guys out there,” Monty retorted.

“Mouthy much?” Josephine said, raising an eyebrow and at that point Bellamy jumped in front of both Monty and Harper. For Sarah looked as strangle him for daring to talk back, though Josephine held her back.

Monty and Harper simply just glared at her. 

“Now.” Sarah turns around as she scratches her neck through her blonde hair, and Bellamy thought he caught an glimpse of an incision scar at the nape of her neck before her hair falls over it. “I’m going to go and give Simone and Russell an update. They are probably concerned that we have not checked in this morning.” She looks at Jaime, “Now, don’t get distracted with your vials and allow these three to get into things they shouldn’t.”

“Hello, I’m here,” Josephine chimed in from annoyance.

Sarah walks away, and Bellamy watches as she leaves the room.

He looks over Jaime’s notes as Monty and Harper talk with Jaime.

“So, you tried to revive an hydro farm in that bunker, huh?” she asked.

“To show that this valley wasn’t the only option,” Monty said, taking one of the tubes on the table. “But someone thought that power and war was more important.”

“So, she burned it and made us march,” said Harper as Avery stepped into the gas station. “If she wasn’t so power hungry, we wouldn’t be here with collars around our necks, and at the mercy of an blood thirsty sadist.”

Bellamy sees Jaime pause before bending down and pulling out an crate. “You know, if the area around the valley was not such an mind field, I’d start using these.” She pulls out an giant vial and on an cylinder, he thought he could read _R.S.T. Handle with care_.

He wondered what R.S.T could mean, but something told him that it could not be good.

“We use this to repair damaged soil in Sanctum,” says Jaime as Avery picks up his notebook. “Created by Sarah herself.”

Josephine rips the vial from Jaime’s hands. “Whoa, whoa, Jaime,” she said. “No need to divulge Sanctum’s secrets.”

“It’s probably not an secret if you bought it with us.” Avery takes the vial from Josephine’s hand.

When they left, Bellamy made sure to place the label on another cylinder before swiping the one that had the R.S.T label under his jacket.

“Hey, stealing is my specialty,” Miller quipped as Bellamy covertly showed them his find at the church

“What is it?” Shaw asked as Gabriel approached them.

“I don’t know,” Bellamy said. “But it was labeled R.S.T.”

“Wait an minute?” Gabriel asked, having seemed to get their attention. “Red Sun Toxin?” he whispered. In fact, he did not expect to see the horror on his blood drained face.

“Is that what it is?” Bellamy demanded as Gabriel took it from his hand.

“When the suns eclipse, this toxin is released, effecting the nervous system, and…” Gabriel doesn’t finish, but from experience, Bellamy did not dare finish the blank. Gabriel hides the cylinder in his cardigan and strolls out of the church.

“Figure one of their own is up to something?” Roan wagered.

“Must be if Gabriel walked out like that,” Harper bought up.

* * *

Clarke remembered where the meeting point was. It was on the outskirts of the original settlement. Last she knew, it was overlooking one of the rows of cabins.

She had an idea where Kane was. After all, he was always with her mom. _He should be in her new medical station_ , she thought as she left the original settlement. Two guards in tow. If anything, Kane was checking on her. Trying to spend an scrap of time with her.

You don’t have to do this, her mind says. You can just walk away.

_Are you going to let him get away with pushing your father for being floated?_ argued that all too familiar dark part of her mind. One that was winning lately.

And as Clarke opened the door, as suspected, Kane was with her mom. Both turned to see her and her two companions at the door. Observing her mom’s blood drained face, it was as if she sensed why they were here.

Kane, on the other hand, appeared as if he had expected it. Almost as if a part of him was resigned to it. “Yes, Clarke?” he asks. “Is there anything you want?”

“He wants to see you,” Clarke answered. “Didn’t say why.”

Kane stepped forward –

“Marcus, no,” her mom protested, the fear evident in her voice. As if she knew that he wasn’t going to be coming back. Clarke felt a tinge of guilt upon seeing that display. Acknowledging the inevitable heartbreak that was about to transpire.

_Remember, he was willing to have your dad executed_ , hissed that voice in her head.

“Abby, I have to,” Kane protested, cupping her face with his hands. “I’ll be fine.”

He kisses her forehead before embracing her. “I love you,” he said. “May We Meet Again.”

The _Skaikru_ parting phrase when one knows they are on death’s door.

“May We Meet Again,” her mother repeated, voice trembling. And Clarke could see her eyes glistening with tears. Not wanting to let go as he approached the door.

It was after he left the gas station that Clarke locked eye contact with her mom before departing out the door after Kane.

They didn’t exchange a word as they walked to their destination. Maybe it was best that they didn’t say anything. Maybe it was the presence of two of the guards accompanying them.

“Long time, no see, Kane,” McCreary called out by the canopy. Walking towards them. His fingers gracing the handle of his gun. And Clarke noticed that Kane was gazing at that action, as if it confirmed to him why he was here.

“If you’re going to kill me, get it over with,” Kane replies with resignation. “In fact, I have figured that you would find a opportunity to carry it out.”

“You’re not as naïve as you look, Kane,” he says with a scoff, “Or were, I should say. Get on your knees, Kane.”

He didn’t argue as he did so, the two guards distancing themselves. So they probably wouldn’t have any blood splattered on them.

McCreary turns to look at her. “Are you willing to do the honors, Clarke?” he asks her.

Clarke could sense Kane’s eyes widening at that, though she shouldn’t be surprised that McCreary would have her be the one to do it. If she killed Kane, her mother might never forgive her.

But he did push for her dad to be executed and pushed for her incarceration.

“Clarke, please,” Kane pleaded as she reached for her gun and hovered over to him. “I know you don’t want to do this. It’s not what I want for you.”

If any hesitation was in her at those words, it had left just as it came. “You pushed for my father to be executed,” she spat out. “You would have pushed for my execution too.”

“Clarke,” he begged, as she raised her gun and clicked the bullet into the chamber. “I’m sorry. But, Jake wouldn’t want you to go this far.”

Didn’t she just help torture Gellert yesterday? She was already crossing the line, why not push the boundary even further. “Trust me, I have already crossed a line yesterday,” she confessed.

Clarke figured that she couldn’t afford to be hesitant due to the man standing a few feet away from this. As to avoid the image being engraved in her head, she closed her eyes before pulling the trigger.

It was when she opened her eyes when she saw Kane’s crumbled corpse.

“Why don’t you keep your eyes open the next time you execute someone,” McCreary suggested in her ear as he walked closer to analyze the corpse.

Keeping her eyes open when she kills someone. Maybe she should next time.

* * *

Abby turned her head to the door as she heard it open and judging by her daughter’s grim expression, it was as if her fears were confirmed.

“He wants to see you,” Clarke informs her. There was something that wasn’t right with her daughter’s demeanor. As if there was something there that she didn’t want her to know.

“You didn’t kill him, did you?” Abby asks, pleading as she approaches her daughter. “Please tell me that you weren’t the one that did it?”

Clarke paused, essentially confirming her worst fears. “Mom, he pushed for my dad to be executed,” Clarke justified. “He wouldn’t have had a problem with me being floated, simply because I knew what dad knew. I mean, forget it, how could you sleep at night for being with the man who was the reason for your pain.”

Abby couldn’t believe what she was hearing. In the past, Clarke would ensure that Kane would be safe for her sake. That she would be safe for his sake. And now to hear this coming from her mouth…

“Who are you?” she asked her. Perplexed by the person she has become. As she was never like this.

Clarke simply blinked. “As I said, he wants to see you,” Clarke said. “You know that he is not the most patient person on this planet.”


End file.
